


I move the stars for no one

by killaidanturner



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Labyrinth Fusion, Childhood Memories, Comedy, Developing Relationship, Extended Metaphors, Falling In Love, Labyrinth - Freeform, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, that's the best way that I can tag it, the goblin king is emotionally abusive to fili as a child
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-14 00:49:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5723314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killaidanturner/pseuds/killaidanturner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a moment he is lost, for a moment he is swimming in crashing waves and drowning in memories he can’t place. </p><p>“You’re him aren’t you? You’re the Goblin King? I want my cousin back.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Goblin King, Goblin King

**Author's Note:**

> oh boy. here we fucking go, after I swore I would never ever write a FiKi au. This is probs gonna be different than a lot of the other stuff that I write so like, idk hang in there with me ok. Thanks to all the peeps I've been bothering about this AU for the past few weeks. durinsprinces, deanohell, nasri, my_trex_has_fleas, y'all are the best for being like "do the thing". if you haven't watched labyrinth I highly suggest that you do.

**2001**

 

“Fili! Kili! I swear to God if you two don’t start behaving I’m going to ask the Goblin King to come take you away!” Jennifer was the babysitter from three houses down. She was one of the only people that could handle the troublesome two.

 

The thing is, they weren’t even that bad, not really. They only acted up when they were left by themselves.

 

Ok that isn’t the truth. Ever since Kili was born three years prior, Fili took an immediate liking to him. One that bordered on crazy adventures and unintentional disasters. Fili, well Fili loved his brother more than anything. The moment he was born he knew that he was a compass of sorts, his true north and his guiding light. Or more so everyone else knew it and saw it but the boys were too young to comprehend such things.

 

Currently the furniture in the house was arranged and spread apart. The dining chairs in the living room and couch cushions thrown about on the floor. Jennifer ran into the room to look at the mess.

 

“I don’t want the Goblin King to come!” Kili’s small voice exclaimed as he ran quickly across the carpet and to the chair that eight year old Fili was standing on. Fili reached down and helped pull Kili onto the chair.

 

“What are you doing?” She asked as she put her hands on her hips and looked at the children.

 

“The floor is lava and we have to get to the castle.” Fili said matter of factly as Kili stood up next to him, his fingers clutching onto Fili’s jeans.

 

“The place is a mess. You drew on the fridge!”

 

“Yeah, that was the map to the castle, we needed it for our adventure. You can ask the so called Goblin King to come take us away after we’re done.” Fili points out at the sea of furniture leading to a fort at the end of the couch, blankets and sheets thrown up.

 

“I can’t do this, come on, let's get you ready for bed.”

 

“No!” Kili shrieked as he started jumping up and down on the chair. “No, no, no! Castle! We have to get to the castle!”

 

“See, we need to get to the castle. You don’t want to upset him do you?”

 

“You got your brother all riled up. Get to the castle and get upstairs in twenty minutes. I’ll read you a bedtime story. In the meantime, I’ll be trying to clean the fridge.” Jennifer stormed off in the direction of the kitchen leaving Fili and Kili with wicked grins.

 

* * *

 

“What are you going to read?” Fili asked as he crawled into bed next to Kili.

 

“Where the Wild Things Are.”

 

“We’ve heard that story a hundred times.” Fili let out a huff of air as his head hit the pillow. Kili giggled and scooted closer to his brother.

 

“You want a new story?”

 

“Yes!” Kili shouted and Jennifer smiled at them.

 

“Alright, I’ll tell you about the Goblin King.”

 

“What does he do?” Fili asked sitting up.

 

“He comes and takes bad children away.”

 

“Why?”

 

“To teach them a lesson.”

 

“What sort of lesson?” Fili asked with a fast beating heart.

 

“To be good kids.”

 

“What if they never learn?”

 

“Then they turn into goblins.” Jennifer made a quick motion as she leaned down to the bed with her hands out as if to grab the boys. Fili immediately moved in front of Kili and Jennifer sat back down in the chair by the bed.

 

“Do you want to hear the story or not?”

 

“I only want to hear it so I can tell you it’s not true.”

 

“All stories have some truth to them Fili. Once upon a time there was a beautiful young girl, she was asked to watch two very troublesome little boys with very similar names.” Outside the window a storm broke. Lightning flashed and thunder rolled causing the balcony doors to open. Jennifer jumped up and ran to the doors as the boys held on tightly to each other. She locked the door and shut the curtains quickly.

 

“Are you sure you want to hear this story?” She asked with her back against the glass doors of the balcony. The boys nodded their heads ‘yes’ in unison.

 

“The Goblin King was a kind and generous king to those who knew how to ask for it. The goblins had awakened at hearing the girl's distress for her situation, knowing that the boys were spoiled and reckless. ‘Say the right words’ the goblins whispered to her at night, ‘and we will take the children to the goblin city, and you will be free’. But the girl knew that the Goblin King would keep the children in the city forever and ever until they finally turned into goblins themselves. So the girl suffered, doomed to watch two troublesome little boys, especially a golden haired one with a strong will and wild ideas. Until one day it became too much and she couldn’t take it anymore.” Jennifer’s voice had taken on a theatrical tone as she told the story to the two boys. She looked down at them and noticed tears welling in Kili’s eyes.

 

“Would you really do that?” He asks as his fingers gripped on to Fili’s shirt.

 

“Of course not Kili. Well maybe to your brother but never to you.” She said it with a wink and it caused both of the boys to giggle. The storm raged on. “Would you like me to continue?”

 

Fili and Kili looked at each other in silent agreement before saying, “yes.”

 

Jennifer reached down and picked up Fili. “‘No, I mustn’t, I mustn't say it,’ the girl said to herself as she held up the child, ‘I can bear it no longer. Goblin King, Goblin King, wherever you may be, take this child of mine far away from me!’”

 

Both children shrieked as Fili kicked. Lightning flashed against the windows, the lights in the house flickering.

 

* * *

 

**Goblin City**

 

“That's not the words!” A room full of goblins watch the scene unfolding through a glass in the center of the room.

 

“What are the words?” One of the goblins ask.

 

“We’ve been doing it for years, shouldn’t you know this by now!”

 

“Shhhh.” Chaos is erupting from the creatures as their whispered words flow through to the girl's ears.

 

* * *

 

Jennifer set down Fili, both children wide awake and nervous. “Alright, alright, no more story. Besides, those aren’t even the words to get the goblins to come take you away.”

 

Fili looked up at her, his blue eyes wide and scared. “What are they then?”

 

With an exasperated sigh, Jennifer said, “I wish the goblins would come and take you away, right now.”

 

The lights in the house go out with a crack of thunder. Kili screams and a moment later the lights turn back on. Jennifer rushes to the bed only to find Kili remaining in it.

 

“No, no, no. Kili where’s your brother?!” Jennifer shouts as she drops to the floor to look under the bed.

 

A high pitched laugh comes from the other side of the room, then the closing of a door. Jennifer sits up quickly as Kili continues to cry.

 

The balcony doors blew open once more, a figure appearing against the billowing dark curtains. He stood tall, over six feet, high cheekbones and long ash blonde hair. A cloak wrapped around his lithe frame with a high collar standing up straight, framing his face.

 

“You’re the Goblin King.” Jennifer whispers as she stares up at the creature before her. “Please, I want the boy back.”

 

“What’s said is said.” His voice rich, deep, and soothing in a way that sent a shiver down her spine.

 

“But, I didn’t mean it.”

 

“Oh, you didn’t?” The Goblin King asks with a smirk, his hands out in front of him as if it was displaying his boredom and amusement at the situation.

 

“Please, where is he?”

 

“You know very well where he is.”

 

“Please bring him back, please.” Her voice broke as tears welled up in her eyes. Kili’s crying quieted down as the small child watches the wonder of the king before him.

 

A chorus of laughter breaks through their conversation. Jennifer turns to look around to see dresser drawers shutting and blankets being tossed.

 

“He’s there, in my castle.” The Goblin King moves to point out the doors, to a new landscape, one filled with red sand and barren bushes. “Do you still want to look for him?” He asked as Jennifer looked back towards the King.

 

“What of the other brother? If I got to your castle, if I go in your labyrinth, what will happen to this one?”

 

“My goblins will watch him until you return, or until his parents get home. Whichever comes first.”

 

“Alright, I’ll go through your labyrinth.”

 

The goblins in the room run out of their hiding places, rushing to Kili on the bed. Jennifer steps through the doors and onto the land of the Goblin King.

 

“You have thirteen hours to retrieve the boy. If you do not make it in that time then both you and him will be trapped here. The boy will become a goblin like all other children brought here and you will be turned into one of the fairies by the gate.”

 

Jennifer nods her head in understanding as the Goblin King disappears before her very eyes. She takes a step towards the gate.

 

* * *

 

Jennifer doesn’t make it in the thirteen hour time frame.

 

* * *

 

The Goblin King leans down to pick up Fili, a child with bright blue eyes and hair a shade of gold the King hasn’t seen in many years. “Maybe I won’t turn you.”

 

“What will you do with me then?” Fili asks quietly as he tries to get out of the King’s grasp.

 

“How would you like to be a prince?”

 

* * *

 

Dis and Vili come home to find their son Kili alone in his room, with a tear stained face and gasping breaths. The room is overturned, furniture thrown about.

 

They fill out a police report and hold onto hope.

 

* * *

 

**Goblin City**

100 Years Later

 

“I can’t always be the Goblin King, Fili. I picked you for a reason. There must always be a King for Goblin City and I want to pass it along to you.”

 

“What will happen to you?” Fili asks. He’s bigger now, about thirteen in human years. A crown that is too big for him rests on his head.

 

“I have been doing this for thousands of years. I’ll be out in the universe, out in the stars. Not fully gone, I’ll always be watching you.”

 

Fili nods his head in understanding.

 

* * *

 

**Goblin City**

200 Years After That

 

“All hail the Goblin King.” The goblins bow at Fili’s feet. He stands tall among them, his crown now fitting his head. He assumes he’s in his twenties now, he thinks about twenty-three but it is hard to keep track of time in a place like this.

 

His crown and his smile glint gold.

 

He holds onto memories, of the place beyond the Goblin City. To a land with blue skies, white clouds, and birds that sang lullabies. What he remembers though is Kili’s hand in his, his small fingers grasping Fili as the goblins pulled him away.

 

He spends years looking for him, years traveling from house to house, to different calls of the Goblin King. He always looks for a boy with brown hair and lively eyes.

 

His memories are a distant thing on the horizon, a castle out of his reach. He reaches and grasps at faint lights. A lost kingdom, a home that belonged to a different boy. A boy that didn’t have darkness under his fingernails the way that dirt seems to get trapped there. A boy that didn’t use smoke, that didn’t fill the sky with it.

  
He takes, and takes, and takes, and does what is required of him. With each child that turns in the goblin city, with each person that fails his heart comes a little more undone, his face a little more carved of stone.

 

* * *

 

When Kili started asking about where Fili had went, when he was still too young to understand that his brother was taken, Dis would put him in her lap and tell him this. “He went to Neverland.”

 

“Neverland?” Kili had asked her.

 

“Yes, Peter Pan came to take him away, to be one of the Lost Boys.” Her voice would crack, and her smile would be forced as she would place a kiss on Kili’s head.

 

“What’s a lost boy?”

 

“A special chosen boy to be a friend of Peter Pan, and to live a land where he doesn’t age. While he is there he has sword fights, and plays with pirates and Peter is taking good care of him.”

 

“I want to go to Neverland! I want to be with Fili!” Kili would shout and throw his arms in the air as if the windows would open and fairy dust would take him away.

 

When he was old enough Dis finally told him that their house was broken into and Kili, for some reason, was left behind, but that she was beyond thankful every day that she still had a son to wake up to.

 

* * *

 

Years pass and over time Kili forgets details about his brother. He forgets the way they played pirates with paper hats and foam swords, how their boat sailed the seven seas without ever leaving the front yard. He forgets the way that Fili wrapped their hands together at night. He forgets the shade of his hair, the blue of his eyes. He forgets the sound of his voice and how he would tell Kili stories at night. How he would teach him about what he was learning in school, things like planets and creatures that roamed the earth long before they were here. He forgets the dimples in Fili’s cheeks when he would smile, his protective nature. He forgets that he loved him, loved him unconditionally before he even knew what the word meant.

 

Kili grows, and grows, and Fili becomes a fading memory.

 

He spends his time learning, sometimes skipping class. He does everything for his parents knowing that they are always grieving for their lost son. He does his best to hope that maybe he can make up for what it is they are missing.

 

He applies to universities and saves up his money and hopes that he will do right by them.

 

And if at night he dreams of a castle, of a labyrinth and strange creatures, he tries to think nothing of it.

 

* * *

 

**2016**

 

“What's this?” Kili asks as he picks up a book sitting on Bilbo’s desk in his office.

 

“Oh that? An old old book. I was going through some boxes today from my old house, things I haven’t unpacked and I found it in there.”

 

Kili looks at the gold lettering on the spine, he traces the letters. _Labyrinth._

 

“Do you know the story?” Bilbo asks as he shuffles some papers before getting ready for his night out with Thorin.

 

“I don’t think so, but the name sounds familiar.”

 

“It’s a children’s book really, a fairy tale, it’s about a king of some sort who rules the land of the goblins.”

 

Kili looks up at Bilbo, his brown eyes wide. “I’m not too sure how, but I think maybe Fili knew this story. Do you mind if I read it while Frodo is asleep? Didn’t bring any of my uni books with me and I’m not to keen on netflix at the moment.”

 

“Of course, anything in this house is yours as well.” Bilbo smiles faintly at Kili, his heart aching at the remembrance of a brother that Kili never really knew.

 

* * *

The spine creaks when he opens it up, it pages giving off a smell of must. Kili twists his face in disgust as he turns the first page.

 

He thinks that all fairy tales have a little bit of loneliness to them. That is just the way they are. The mermaid that falls in love with a man? She was lonely in the sea. Rapunzel in her tower? Lonely. Cinderella? Lonely. The dwarves while Snow White is in her glass coffin? Lonely. All fairy tales have this element. As he reads the tale of the Labyrinth, it is not the girl who thinks her life unfair that is lonely but instead the Goblin King. A man out of place in a land full of strange creatures with no one to understand him.

 

For the smallest moment he lets himself think that if this were a fairy tale then the story would be about him, that he would be the lonely one in the equation. A boy without his brother, not even fully realizing what he is missing.

 

He pushes the thought away, he never lets himself think about Fili and what he could have known.

 

Instead he falls into the story, his eyes moving quickly as he follows the story of a girl making her way through the labyrinth. He gets halfway through the book before he hears crying from upstairs.

 

“Alright, alright! I hear you!” Kili shouts as he rushes into his cousin's room. He tosses the book on the changing table.  

 

He lifts the baby up out of his crib and rocks him back and forth against his chest. He continues to cry and Kili rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m not the best but you aren’t that great yourself kiddo.”

 

“Ok Frodo, time to stop crying, yeah? Thorin and Bilbo will be home soon and I’ll be free of you and you’ll be free of me and next time we see each other we can just pretend that this never happened. Sound good?” Frodo continues to cry as he pushes himself away from Kili.

 

Kili sets him back down in his crib and sighs as he rests his arms against the railing looking down at this newly acquired cousin. “I don’t know what to do. Maybe a story?”

 

Frodo hiccups and silences his crying as he looks up at Kili. “A story it is then.”

 

“There once was a dashing, handsome, ravishing,” Frodo lets out a whine of complaint, “-ok I get it. There once was a young man who offered to watch his cousin on the weekends and sacrificing a social life for some money. The child was ungrateful and didn’t like his baby sitter so he did awful things like throw his food, throw up his food, and throw temper tantrums. The handsome young man who was responsible for him grew very tired because all he wanted was a life. One night the child really tried his patience and he asked the Goblin King to come take the child away.”

 

Kili listens at the sound of rain hitting the balcony outside. He stops his story and looks out the glass doors. The scene feels familiar to him but he can’t seem to place it. He knows the weather didn’t call for rain today, not in the middle of summer, not when the city had been under a dry spell for weeks.

 

“And the man said, ‘I wish the goblins would come take you away, right now’.” His voice is quiet and almost not his own as he says it. He doesn’t recognize his voice or the despondent tone it takes.

 

The balcony doors fly open and the heavy smell of sand and rain coats Kili’s lungs, it hits him in an all too familiar wave.

 

Kili looks over at the crib to find it empty then back at the shuttering doors. There is a man standing between them, his hair long and in waves of gold. His skin is tanned and his frame muscular but not too thick. Kili looks at him, his eyes starting at the man’s feet and finally resting on cobalt eyes. A black cloak covers his shoulders, a high arching collar resting around his neck.

 

For a moment he is lost, for a moment he is swimming in crashing waves and drowning in memories he can’t place.

 

“You’re him aren’t you? You’re the Goblin King? I want my cousin back.”

 

“What’s said is said.” Another wave of familiarity.

 

“I didn’t mean it.” Kili is shaking his head no, his hair coming loose from the bun that it was tied in.

 

“Oh you didn’t?” The Goblin King pulls his lips up into a half smirk as he takes off his gloves, his eyes focused on Kili.

 

“I may have meant it a little bit.” Kili whispers as he watches the King’s movements. He watches his slow walk, every movement planned out. He walks with his back straight, his movements regal and fluid.

 

“Of course you did. Don’t lie to me, it’s best that we don’t lie to each other.” The Goblin King looks at the book sitting on the changing table, his fingers run over the hard cover.

 

Kili nods his head in agreement though he isn’t too sure why. “My cousin, I need him back, Thorin will be devastated and-”

 

“Thorin?” It rolls off of the Goblin King’s tongue, the first syllable comes out harsh as if he hasn’t said the word before.

 

“Yeah my uncle, Frodo’s adopted, listen it’s complicated ok. Can I have him back?” Kili pushes tucks a loose strand of his long brown hair out of his face and takes a deep breath.

 

“You know exactly where he is, Kili, he’s out there in the Goblin City.” The Goblin King moves and points towards his castle, the center of the labyrinth.

 

Kili follows the Goblin King’s arm, the sharp point on his wrist, then his long thin fingers covered in gold rings, to a castle in the center of a large labyrinth. The sky is covered in red, red clouds, a thin hazy layer of red dust settles along the walls of the maze. The air is warm as it rolls across Kili’s face, as he steps off of the balcony and into the realm of the Goblin King.

 

“The castle.” Kili whispers and this time when he turns around the house is no longer behind him, it is just a desolate wasteland of hues of red and endless grains of sand.

 

“Turn back now Kili, before it’s too late.” His name rolls of the Goblin King’s tongue softly, with intimacy laced into the vowels.

 

“I can’t. I have to fix this.” Kili turns back around to try to take in the full view of the labyrinth, his mind already trying to plot out ways to get through it. “It doesn’t look that far.”

 

“It’s further than you think.” The Goblin King is right behind Kili, his voice in his ear, his stomach pressed along Kili’s back. It sends a shiver down the brunette’s spine. Kili takes a step forward to prevent himself from falling back into the touch.

 

The Goblin King moves behind him, walks over to a tree without any leaves and materializes a clock in front of them. “You have thirteen hours to retrieve your cousin.”

 

“And if I don’t?” Kili’s eyebrows knit together, his eyes narrowing as he watches the king in all of his careful movements. For the first time Kili thinks that he looks young, not too much older than himself but he talks with a deep voice, a voice that sounds as if it has withstanded time, that it has clawed through centuries.

 

“Then he will be mine forever, he will turn into a goblin and remain within these walls.” There is something about the way he says it, as if the idea isn’t too appealing to him. Though Kili supposes if he’s been taking children for hundreds of years that one more is just another check on his list.

 

“And what will happen to me?”

 

The Goblin King smirks at him, his lips twisting into a wicked thing. “You have thirteen hours.”

 

Kili takes in a deep breath before setting off down the hill and towards the gate of the labyrinth. “This can’t be that hard.”


	2. Difference of Opinion

The air in the realm of the Goblin King is warmer, red fire blazing through the skies. This area is not a kind area, it is not like in fairy tales where there are ivy vines clinging to cottage walls, lush green lands and singing meadows. There are thorns, and briars and a pond with black water. Kili walks down the hill to the wall of the labyrinth, only to come across a man a few inches shorter than him with a large brown hat with the ear flaps turned up at the sides.

 

“Excuse me.” Kili calls out to the man who seems to be spraying bugs with a small canister of spray. As he gets close he realizes that they are not bugs at all but instead creatures that he would assume to be fairies.

 

“I hope I wake up in a bit and this was all some wild dream.” Kili mutters to himself which causes the man to turn around.

 

“You won't and it’s not.” He says it with a forced smile before he goes back to spraying the fairies. “Fifty-three, fifty-four,” The man kicks dirt up on one of the fairies who emits a high pitched shriek.

 

“Hey, stop that!” Kili lunges forward and pulls the man back. “You’re being horrible.”

 

“No I ain't, and my name is Bofur. What’s yours?”

 

“Kili.”

 

“Of course it is.” Bofur rolls his eyes and goes back to spraying the fairies. “Fifty-five!”

 

“What’s that suppose to mean?”

 

“It means you’re not the first boy I’ve met with brown hair and that colour skin and those colour eyes.” Bofur keeps walking along with his canister of spray and shooting the fairies as he goes.

 

“The Goblin King, he takes a lot of children then?”

 

“The Goblin King does what it is he is suppose to do, he takes children to be in the Goblin City and answers the call of the Goblin King. The goblins have been known to keep an eye out for boys that fit your description.” Bofur keeps focused on his task as he walks along the wall, stepping over roots and vines as he does pest control.

 

“My description? Why is that?” Kili follows behind him curiously as his eyes go from the man to the wall, looking for a point of entrance while also wanting to hear what strange reason there is for the man's answer.

 

“You ask a lot of questions and the Goblin King can probably hear us.” Bofur points around to nothing in particular and Kili has to fight a roll of his eyes.

 

“If I’m to do this labyrinth then I should be able to know.” Kili wonders if he sounds petulant or forthcoming. He knows that at home he gets his way a lot but he feels like that more so has to do with being an only child. He has a lot of friends and people seem to like him but he knows he can be pushy and abrasive, and there is no telling what that kind of talking can do in a place like this.

 

“He wasn’t always our king. He was a child once too, he grew up here. We think he’s looking for someone." Bofur looks around their area again, at the emptyness of the briars before continuing on, "I shouldn't have said anything but it might already be too late. The goblins can influence people to say the chant to get him to show up, to take the child away.” Bofur looks Kili up and down, taking in his full frame and appearance. The pulled back long brown hair, the narrow hips and broad shoulders, the same build as their King. He thinks that this man before him though might be taller, his legs look longer and leaner. He tries not to think anything of the similarity in their names, or the same fierce look in their eyes.

 

“And you think I was just another one of those people? Just someone else on his list?” Kili narrows his eyes, his forehead pinching near the bridge of his nose as he is trying to work out the answer himself.

 

“Yes, I don’t think the Goblin King will ever find who he is looking for.” Bofur says it with resolve, as if he has known this all along. Mainly apart of him hopes that the brunette in front of him is not who the king is looking for, for everyone's sake. He picks back up his work and sprays another fairy.

 

“Huh,” Kili says as he looks at the brick wall of the labyrinth, “so how do I get in there?”

 

“You’re really going to go in there?” Bofur looks back at him.

 

“I have to.”

 

“Yeah well I do suppose that is the whole point. Well then, off you go.” He waves his arm to a set of iron doors that swing open. Kili swears the doors were not there a moment ago. A mist rolls out of the labyrinth, something out of an old horror film and Kili has to wonder who designed this place and the theatrics of it all. 

 

He walks through the doors and into the labyrinth, right against the first wall only to have Bofur right behind him.

 

“The question is, do you go left or do you go right?” Bofur moves in front of him and leans against the bricks that seem to be coated in slime in some places and webbing in others. 

 

“Which way would you go?” Kili looks down each long stretch and sees that they look almost identical to each other, just cement and brick wall and dead vines.

 

“Neither. I would try to leave this place all together.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Even if you make it to the castle in the Goblin City, you will never make it out.” Bofur pushes himself off of the wall he was leaning on and back towards the gate to leave.

 

“Difference of opinion.” Kili calls back to him as Bofur shuts the doors behind him.

 

“Thanks for nothing Buffy.” He whispers to himself.

 

“It’s Bofur!” He hears over the wall of the labyrinth and he can’t help but smile for a moment.

 

Kili looks left and right again before deciding to go with the right side of the labyrinth. He starts off with his movements slow and hesitant, moving carefully over fallen branches and sticks. “Ok, you can do this Kili, you got this.” He takes off a little faster, trying to be careful of obstacles. He gets in the hang of it, his eyes adjusting quickly to his surroundings as he takes off sprinting. He jumps over the bigger branches and ducks under one's still hanging low. He runs and runs until his lungs hurt and he leans against a wall.

 

“There aren't even any turns!” He shouts as his feet kick the wall behind him.

 

“‘Ello!”

 

Kili looks around for the sound of the noise to notice a small blue worm with a red scarf resting on the ledge of a brick. “Oh, hello.” Kili says hesitantly as he leans down to inspect the creature.

 

“Not hello, I said ‘ello.” The worm blinks at him and waits for a response.

 

Kili looks around at his surroundings, and the strange moss covered eyes that stick out between the bricks growing like weeds, and figures it can’t get any weirder than this. “You’re a worm.”

 

“Yeah, that I am. Come inside and meet the missus, have a cup of tea.” The worm nods to a crack in the bricks and Kili raises his eyebrows in amusement.

 

“No thank you, that’s alright. By any chance do you happen to know your way around the labyrinth?”

 

“Me? No, I’m just a worm.”

 

Kili lets out a sigh of frustration. “It’s just there’s no turns or gaps or anything.”

 

“Sure there are! You just aren’t looking, there’s one right in front of you.” The worm tilts it's head to the wall opposite of them.

 

“No there isn’t.” Kili says as he stands up and walks slowly to the wall in front of him, his hands held out hesitantly.

 

The worm laughs a tiny hiccup of a laugh and smiles at Kili, “just try walking through there.”

 

Kili keeps his hands held out as he walks through the opening in the brick wall. “What the-”

 

“Things are not always what they seem in this place, can’t take anything for granted. Go on then.”

 

“That was incredibly helpful.” Kili turns right and out of sight of the worm when he hears it call back.

 

“No, no, not that way, never go that way!”

 

He turns back around and does a small wave at the worm, “oh thanks!” before going in the opposite direction with a renewed hope and a bounce in his step.

 

“No, oh he should have gone the other way, he would have gone straight to that castle.”

 

* * *

 

The wall shifts closed behind Kili, locking him inside of the labyrinth. He walks to a post in the middle of an opening of the walls, a cement post with sculpted hands pointing in every feasible direction.

 

He thinks that this isn’t how fairy tales start. That there should have been a story about blue skies and happiness before this came crashing down. He thinks that he wasn’t exactly happy, and skies weren’t blue but always had more of a shade of gray to him. That all of his happiness was reserved for his mother and father, to cover up their anguish and grief.

 

He remembers being younger and wanting adventure. He would dream of gathering fairy dust, of sprinkling it on his bed and turning it into a ship so that he could sail it into Neverland. That he would sail beyond the skies, beyond the third star to the right and straight on till morning. That he would find the Lost Boys and that Fili would be waiting for him.

 

He dreamed that they would fight of Captain Hook, that it would take the two of them together to knock the pirate over the side of his ship and into crocodile infested waters. That after, Kili would sail them back home to England and Fili would be forever grateful. That the story would end with a clear blue sky and everyone happy.

 

Instead he stands in this twisted fairy tale, fairy tales are supposed to have sword fights and princes and someone locked away in a castle. All he has are this brick walls and nothing to swing with, there are no swords and he’s hoping that these walls don’t contain a dragon.

 

Kili hears the cry of a baby, of Frodo come from the direction to his left. It’s enough to snap him out of his day dream of a far off life and much different adventures. He can’t let himself think about Fili, not at a moment like this, not when he hasn’t thought about any insane rescue missions in years. He knows he is far away from the castle but perhaps the Goblin King let him hear his cousins cries, perhaps it is a trick of the mind or some sort of power play all together. Regardless of the motives behind it, whether the cry is real or not Kili tightens his jaw and takes off in between an opening, down a stone paved walkway and to what he thinks is the castle.

 

“I’m coming Frodo.”

 

* * *

 

Fili sits in his throne in, his feet hanging over the side of the arm of it, a hand pinching the bridge of his nose. His tight gray trousers stretch over his thighs, black boots up to his knees, a white button down shirt, with barely any of the buttons done clings to his frame, the only thing that seems to be holding it in place is a tight black vest.

 

The room is filled with guards, with goblins and various animals from the labyrinth. There is commotion as the goblins fight with each other, bantering and throwing things. The room is all cold gray stone and the Goblin King’s throne is vast and made of leather and bone.

 

Frodo sits on a blanket in the center of the goblins, his cries going unnoticed.

 

“Someone please feed the child.” He says as he taps a riding crop against his leg.

 

The goblins quiet knowing that the king is in no mood for anything to go wrong.

 

“Do you think it is him?” One of the guards asks which causes Fili to open his eyes and sit up properly in his throne.

 

“You heard him talking to the gatekeeper, he said his name is Kili, I am most certain. But I knew it the moment I saw him.” Fili can’t explain to these creatures the swell in his chest, the way it aches just thinking about Kili’s name. How is mind is fighting through muddle and confusion. He materializes a crystal ball quickly with his hands, he looks into the small orb as he spins it between his fingers and tosses it back and forth between his hands. An image spins in the center of it then comes into focus. Fili looks at Kili standing by the sign post filled with pointing fingers, his eyes distant and far off. Fili wants to reach out through the small crystal, to his brother, to the boy that he used to hold so dearly to him. He wants to feel his skin, to know its warmth. He wonders if it would be soft, if his hands would be gentle. 

 

“What are you going to do about it my lord?” It pulls Fili out of his day dream, his eyes unlocking from Kili's frame and brings him back into his throne room filled with his subjects. 

 

Fili thinks about it, all of the various ways that he can confront his brother. He doesn’t know what he is like at this age, or how long it has even been for him, all Fili knows that whatever Kili has gone through that Fili has endured much more. Kili seems to be making friends easily through the labyrinth and getting help from those that live within its walls, he believes that Kili is smart and will make it well before the thirteen hour time mark.

 

He looks up at the clock on the wall, to its large red ceramic hands ticking away to see that less than an hour has passed and Kili as well on his way into the city. Fili has seen his sharp eyes, how he notices everything around him. He smirks at this knowledge, knowing that Kili is a match for him.

 

“Make the labyrinth harder.”   


 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks so much for all the amazing feedback! it past 1am and I was very adamant about updating this soon so here it is and now I need to sleep


	3. Rabbit Hole

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He would try to remember the color of saltwater, the color of a blue sky, any color besides dusk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is especially dedicated to somanyofthekids who won a contest with me and instead of a fic asked for a new update on this fic, here it is dear, I hope that you like it. check out their [tumblr](http://somanyofthekids.tumblr.com/) and their [ao3](http://archiveofourown.org/users/somanyofthekids#_=_)

When Fili was growing up in the goblin realm he would watch the hourglass in the throne room. The king would tip it over every time a new person entered the labyrinth. Fili would spend hours watching the sand grains fall not realizing that it was measuring time, not realizing that there was someone working their way through the puzzles and walls as they tried to reach someone that was taken from them.

 

As he got older he understood what it meant and at first the hourglass seemed horrible to him, he couldn’t bear the thought of someone not making it through the maze’s every shifting walls and the Goblin King’s ruthless tricks. 

 

He watched as people gave up, as people asked to go back home and for the Goblin to keep the child. Sometimes the king was forgiving and he would grant this wish, another child in his ever growing city. Other times the King would demand that they finish the maze, that they work until their time was up and if they did not make it then they would become a fixture in his realm, a part of the maze forever. 

 

Sometimes they would be turned into door knockers, guards, sometimes they were keepers of certain doors, tricksters and other creatures to make the maze just a little bit harder. 

 

There was an old man with a bird on his head that rested in a quieter part of the maze, there to help with guidance, the only creature of its kind within the walls. When Fili had asked about him to the previous king all the king had said was that he was there even before the king’s own time in the labyrinth and would remain there long after. 

 

When he was about twelve he began to hold on hope for them, for the people thrown into the maze and expected to fight for the ones they love. 

 

He would watch the sand with new wonder, with each grain he would wish and push for the person to make it through. He would imagine the sand grains as gems instead, as bright colors filtering through. 

 

“Why do you care so much?” The Goblin King had asked him one day. Fili was sitting in his smaller throne next to the king’s large one, tears trickling down his face. He didn’t understand then why his chair matched the king’s or why he was held with such high regard. He didn’t know then of the king’s plans for him.

 

“It’s not fair!” Fili shouted, his hands clenching the sides of throne. 

 

The Goblin King smiled down at him, a wicked smile, all teeth and flashing eyes. “Oh that is the first I have heard that from you. Picking up on people in the labyrinth are you? They’re teaching you dreadful phrases.” He leaned back in his chair with a new mask of boredom on his features.

 

“But it isn’t fair!”

 

“How is it not fair? They asked for me to take away a child and then asked for the child back, that is what is not fair. They must learn that things aren’t always handed to them. Tell me Fili, would you fight the labyrinth? Is there someone you care about enough to learn it’s walls and all of it’s hidden traps?”

 

Fili tightened his small jaw, his gaze narrowing. “I would fight for my brother.” 

 

“Of course you would. There are different types of love and different ways of showing it.” 

 

“What do you mean?” Fili relaxed his shoulders as he watched the king get out of his chair and move to the window overlooking the castle entrance. 

 

“Do you think that I do not love the people that enter the labyrinth? Perhaps I love them and that is why I give them a second chance. Do you understand?” 

 

Fili nodded his head in agreement though at the time he wasn’t sure that he did. 

 

“Good, I will hear no more talk of this brother of yours. You’re mine and you will continue to stay that way. You have always carried fire and light inside of you Fili, you need to learn how to wield them.”

 

* * *

Fili spent his time learning how to manipulate the magic in the realm, how to use the crystal orbs the king held so dear to him.

 

“Can you find someone, in the mortal realm?” Fili looked at the orb in his hands, images flickering to places beyond the walls of the labyrinth. 

 

“All I can do is view those who may be likely to fall to the whims of asking for my help, those in need. If they are not in need then I cannot see them.” 

 

Fili nodded his head, hoping that one day Kili would be in need enough to ask for the Goblin King. It was a selfish thing to want, cruel even but the idea spun in his head. He created his own castle out of the idea, spires and giant walls, ones lined with ivy and growing things. 

 

He always felt like he was built for something more than a lonely throne and a castle of dust.

 

* * *

 

“What lies beyond the sands?” Fili asked as he stood at the gate with the Goblin King.

 

“A forest.”

 

Fili looked up at him in surprise, “a forest?” He thought of green, of trees and branches and birds singing.

 

“Yes, but not the kind you’re thinking. Its roots lie deep and the light does not reach it.”

 

“I’m gonna make it grow.” 

 

The king let out a small laugh, amused at the child beside him. “Still so determined and brave. This isn’t a fairy tale Fili, you aren’t something locked away in a tower. I give you freedom to walk the realm and there is no one to come save you, you do not need saving. There is no such things as happy endings. Those books you read as a child? Beauty falls in love with a beast, a wolf falls in love with a girl, tales as old as time, it’s all rubbish. Remember that. You won't make the forest grow, you won't change anything within this realm.”

 

Maybe Fili held onto the idea of fairy dust, maybe he held onto the idea of sword fights and something bigger than what was being told to him.   
  


 

* * *

“After you leave, and I am the king, what will happen when I don’t wish to be the king any longer?”

 

“There is always a king of the realm, you will have to pass it along to another and they will rule.” 

 

“And if I don’t?”

 

“Then you will always be the Goblin King.”  
  


 

* * *

After Fili was crowned king he spent his time answering the call, spent his time using the goblins to whisper in ears and entice people into the labyrinth and if there was a brown haired boy in need of the king’s help then Fili held on hope. He built another tower in the castle of his mind, always reaching toward the sky.

 

* * *

As the years passed Fili grew desperate, his games became cruel when he realized it was not his brother in the walls but instead another. He would shift walls, change the floors, entice the goblins to set up more and more riddles.

 

At times he would ensure that they wouldn’t make it through the labyrinth, that they would become apart of his kingdom, a kingdom built of hearts instead of bloodshed and bone.  He would scream and open his mouth as wide as the sky. 

 

In those moments is when he felt the most lost, a battle raging inside of him.

 

Ribbons of red in the sky as wildfires blazed on the outskirts of the kingdom, footprints in the sand, watching, watching, watching, as his dreams would go up in smoke. It was in those moments he would return to the castle, to the hourglass. He would flip it over and watch the grains of sand begin to fall. His world painted in hues of red when they should be shades of gold.

 

He would try to remember the color of saltwater, the color of a blue sky, any color besides dusk. 

 

Sometimes when he would try to remember these things he would remember soft brown eyes instead.

 

* * *

At night Fili would go outside. He would look up at the night sky to it's purple and yellow haze. He would look up at the stars and the expanse that they took, how there was scarcely a spot in the sky without one.

 

At night he would talk to the stars and tell them stories and dreams. He would tell them how he imagined Kili to be grown now, how he imagined him to be brave. He would tell the stars how he wanted nothing more than to bring his brother here to his realm, to have a kingdom of their own.

 

He would ask the stars what they thought, if perhaps these stars saw Kili and that they watched over him. Would Kili remember him? Did he dream the way that Fili did? Of their hands finding one another. Would Kili want to rule this realm? Or would he think Fili something dangerous, something to be unforgiven?

 

The stars were deaf to his calls and to his dreams but still he spoke.

 

* * *

“He’s heading to the cards my king, what shall we do?”

 

“Tell them that they ensure he falls into the helping hands, I don’t want him reaching the castle. Not yet. I haven’t had enough time.”

 

“Enough time for what?” The goblin asks as he prepares to head out of the castle and down the the cards that guard two of the doors in the labyrinth. 

 

“It is of none of your concern, now go.” Fili tosses a crystal into the air and catches it as the image begins to spin on Kili moving quickly through the labyrinth, his feet quick and his eyes blazing and inviting all at once. Not the way that Fili remembers them but he supposes that they would change over time from when he was a child. 

 

Now Kili’s gaze held something darker, they looked as if they were crafted from fire and Fili wants to watch himself burn. 

 

* * *

Kili runs up stone steps, turns right past a wall and looks around at his surroundings to see if the height gives him more of an advantage to see the tops of the walls and where they might break at.

 

When he realizes he still can't see he sighs. “This place is horrible, it's more Alice in Wonderland than anything.” 

 

“That’s not even the half of it.” A thick, what Kili assumes to be Scottish, accent rolls towards him. He turns quickly to notice two cards from a playing deck, one red, one blue, guarding two doors. 

 

“What was that?” He hesitantly stepps towards the cards, waiting for a reply.

 

A face appears from behind the red card, “I said that’s not even the half of it.”  Another face appears at the bottom of the red card and Kili notices the two sets of arms, one at the bottom and one at the top. Each set holding one spear. The heads disappear again with a laugh.

 

“Listen, whatever this is, do you know the way past the dead end back over that wall? I was trying-” Kili points with his thumb over his shoulder.

 

The two heads on the red card appear, along with the ones on the blue. “That’s not the dead end.” One from the red card smirks while a head from the blue card chips in, “this is!” Laughter erupts from the cards as their spears and hands shake.

 

“What do you mean?” Kili turns around to find the wall completely closed and the entrance to this small alcove gone. “You gotta be kidding me.” He lets out a sigh and a deep breath as he turns back around to the card in front of him. He notices that the cards have the marks of Jack on them and Kili mutters to himself, “couple of jokers more like it.”

 

“It looks like you’re only way out of here is to try one of these doors.”

 

“One of them leads to the castle at the center of the labyrinth.”

 

“And the other-”

 

“Bum bum bum bum-” one of the blue cards makes a noise as if imitating music in a thriller film.

 

“- to certain death!” The red card exclaims with a touch too many dramatics and Kili has to resist snatching a spear from him and putting it to good use. 

 

“Ooooooohhhhhhhhhh!” All four heads make the noise simultaneously and Kili looks around the small alcove in hopes that someone would be standing behind him and he would be able to say,  _ ‘are you seeing this.’ _

 

“Ok, I’ll play along. Which one is which?” 

 

The head at the bottom of the red card pops out, “we don’t know!”

 

“But they do!” The head at the bottom of the blue card points up to the heads at the top. 

 

“Fine, then I’ll ask them.” Kili tries not to let his frustration show but it's hard in a place built to deter and play tricks.

 

“You can't.”

 

“You can only ask one of us.”

 

“It’s in the rules, and I should warn you that one of us always tells the truth-”

 

“-and the other always lies.”

 

“He always lies.” The blue card gestures to the red.

 

“I do not!”

 

“What a lie.” The blue card looks up at the sky, his eyes searching as if he couldn’t be bothered with this conversation. All four heads start arguing as Kili walks up to the red one.

 

“Answer yes or no, would he tell me that this door leads to the castle?”

 

“Uhhhh,” the top head looks over at the blue card then down at the head at the bottom, he disappears his face to whisper at his counterpart and then reappears. 

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Then the other door leads to the castle and this door leads to “certain death”.” Kili puts his fingers in quotations as he says it.

 

“Oh, how do you know? He could be telling the truth.” The red card says in reference to the blue card calling him a liar moments before.

 

“But then you wouldn’t be, so if you told me that he said yes then I know the answer would still be no.”

 

“But I could be telling the truth!” The red card blurts out.

 

“But then he would be lying.” Kili points at the blue card.

 

“Wait a minute, is that right?” The red card turns to the blue card who is looking on in amazement. 

 

“I don’t know! I’ve never understood it!” Laughter breaks out again and Kili smiles.

 

“No, it’s right, I’ve figured it out.” The blue card steps aside to let Kili pass.

 

He pushes the thick iron door open with words under his breath, “glad that’s over.”

 

The floor falls under him as he falls and falls and falls into darkness. 

 

Perhaps boys too can fall down rabbit holes, perhaps they can spill tea on their skin and let it burn, perhaps there is no rabbit there to guide. Perhaps the bad things in fairy tales aren’t just meant for girls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate the part with the guards at the door so I changed their look a little bit to fit what I wanted to do but the dialogue from the scene is mostly the same, I just changed Kili to fit how I need him :)


	4. The Wolf & I

_ “You shouldn’t feel so much.” _

 

The old king’s words play over and over in Fili’s head as he watches Kili out in the labyrinth. It burns in his skull and makes him hate all of the things that he feels. He doesn’t know what is right, what he should be doing. He turns away from his shadow, how it clings to him like a second skin. He turns around the mirror in his room, not wanting to see his own reflection. Not wanting to know the color of his eyes, or the shade of his hair. To him it is all the same these days. 

 

He would assume that his eyes are blue, that they speak of skies or water. He can’t say he remembers those things. Instead when he looks at them he would say they are more like the sky when the sun has set across the horizon and it paints streaks of orange and red across it. He knows no other sky, no other colors besides the one in his realm. 

 

He has built a treasure map of these things, of forgotten memories and the last piece of the map resides in a hole in Kili’s heart. 

 

He begs for nightfall, for the cover of stars. He begs for the moon to hang low and his words to be heard. He needs guidance even though he knows the stars will not answer him. At least at night he no longer has a shadow. 

  
  


* * *

 

“Kili will be in the oubliette, I expect you to help him get out.” Fili leans down to match Bofur’s height.

 

“Where do you want me to take him?”

 

“Not back to the beginning but a few steps back at least. He’s moving too fast, it will be over too soon.” 

 

“What does it matter? Others have made it through the labyrinth, you’ve never cared before.”

 

“Do you need to question me? Or would you like to go back to spending time in the oubliette? I can find one that you don’t know the way out of if that is what you wish, though I would prefer not to go down that path. I’m not asking you to do anything out of the normal to him, just take him back before the cards, get him turned around a bit.” 

 

“Yes my king.” Bofur bows as he watches his king disappear. He thinks it a little odd now indeed that the king’s name and the man in the labyrinths are so similar. 

  
  


* * *

“Fuck!” Kili shouts as he falls down the dark hole. He realizes his momentum has stopped and he looks around at what is visible from the light pouring in at the top. He notices that he is being held in place by dozens of hands, nothing more than hands.

 

“What the hell? What is this?” Kili asks as he drops another foot only to be caught again.

 

A few of the hands form to make a mouth, a nose, and a set of eyes. “We’re helping hands.”

 

“Helping hands.” Kili repeats, his hair coming loose from it’s bun and falling into his face. He blows out a huff of air to move the strands.

 

“Yes, would you like us to let go?” 

 

The hands drop him another foot.

 

“No!” He shouts and they catch him again. 

 

Another set of hands make another face, “well which was it it then?”

 

“Which way?” Kili asks looking around at the hands holding him, a few on his legs and some gripping his waist and a few holding his arms up.

 

“Up or down?” 

 

“Come on, come on, we haven’t got all day.” 

 

“Which way do you want to go?”

 

“It’s a big decision for him, give him a moment.”

 

“Which way?”

 

The hands are talking over each other and Kili is trying to look down to see if he can see what is beneath him. 

 

“Well since I’m pointed that way, I guess I’ll go down. I mean why not, right?” He’s more so trying to convince himself of his decision than anything. 

 

“He chose down.” 

 

“Going down!” 

 

The hands let go of Kili, dropping him down an open hole at the bottom.

 

“This was a mistake!” He shouts to himself as he falls passed the hands. 

 

“Too late now!” They call back to him as he lands on a dirt floor. A grate covers the hole he fell through, a small light filtering through it. 

 

“Great.” Kili mutters as he dusted off his clothes. 

 

* * *

The Goblin King stares through his crystal as Kili, hair disarray and his face showing tired features. For a fleeting moment he feels a bang in his chest, that Kili’s smile that speaks of blue sky promises is gone.

 

“He’s in the oubliette.” Fili twists the crystal around in his hands as he wonders what Kili’s next move will be.

 

“Isn’t that where you wanted him?” One of the goblins asks as they look into the crystal. 

 

“It’s exactly where I wanted him.” Fili tosses his crystal up into the air, the image frozen on Kili’s face.

 

* * *

“Is there something there?” Kili calls out into the dark as he hears footsteps approaching. A match strikes and then a candle is lit.

 

“Yes, I’m here, you grown idiot. Knew you were going to head into trouble, could tell you were reckless.” Bofur grabs the candle he just lit and walks it over to where Kili is sitting on the dirt and dust covered floor.

 

“Reckless. Haven’t heard that one in a long time.” Not since he was a child, not since his brother was at his side and they would make up outlandish games.

 

“Well you are, running around in here, trying to one up the goblins in the maze. They report to the king, no matter what game you think you’re playing you’re destined to lose. If you’re in the oubliette it is because the king wishes it so.”

 

“Great. So what you’re saying is, is that it doesn’t matter what I do because the king will always be one step ahead?” Kili stands up to look down at Bofur.

 

“That’s why I’m here. At your service.” Bofur bows and grins up at Kili.

 

“At my service?”

 

“It means I’m here to help.”

 

Kili looks around the room now that it is properly lit. It’s a circular cave, except there is no entrance. 

 

“Oh, you’re looking aroud now? I’m sure you just noticed there ain't no doors in here. This is an oubliette, the labyrinth is full of them.”

 

“Really? I didn’t know that.” Kili’s voice sounds far off and disinterested as he pushes at the walls in the small cave, trying to find some sort of secret entrance. 

 

“Don’t be such a smart arse. You don’t even know what an oubliette is.”

 

Kili stops pushing at the walls and looking around to look at Bofur. “Do you?” He asks with his eyebrows raised. 

 

“Yes I do. It’s a place that you put people to forget about them.”

 

Kili pauses, taking in Bofur’s words. “Is that what happened to you, did someone forget about you?”

 

Bofur looks away then back at Kili. “It wasn’t the current king, no he’s not as cruel, though he may be if he wanted you down here. It was the king before him. I spent plenty of years down here. But lucky for you that means I know how to get out.” 

 

“I’m sorry,” Kili blurts out.

 

“For what? It’s not your fault, besides the new king made me gatekeeper so I supposes that means I can roam the labyrinth. Do you want to get out of here or not? We’re wasting time.” Bofur picks up a thin wooden door from the ground and pushes it against the cave wall. He unlocks it with one of the many keys hanging from his belt. The door opens only to have pots, pans and other various knick knacks come falling out onto the floor. 

 

“Broom closet. Can’t always be right.” Bofur kicks the objects out of the way so he can close the door again. This time he takes the key and unlocks the door from the right side. When he opens it, it opens to a tunnel.

 

“Right, come on then.” Bofur walks with a jig in his step as he exits the oubliette. 

 

Kili follows without a second glance back into the dark room. 

 

* * *

Fili left his throne room and went out beyond the cities wall, past the labyrinth and to the forest. He hadn’t been to the wooded area in years, over ten years to be exact. He thinks it's unfortunate that even after all these years in his realm he still has such a grasp on time.

 

He walks to the thick branches, he runs a hand along the barren bark. _ No different,  _ he thinks to himself as he stares out into the thickness of it, into the dark where he can no longer see what the woods conceal. 

 

He thought perhaps, well he doesn’t know what he thought. There’s an idea that sits in the back of his mind, an idea that now that Kili is here that he would give the king the strength enough to extend his magic, out into this desolate wasteland, a forest of despair. He sighs as he crouches down. 

 

Under the thick forest floor, covered in dead leaves in their shades of brown and gray is a flower coming into bloom, breaking it’s way through the decay. 

 

It’s yellow and bright and not a color Fili has since in almost three hundred years. He smiles to himself and lets out a low laugh. He feels almost manic with it, the laughter rising until he is sitting on the forest floor, his fingers delicate as they touch the soft petals on the flower. 

 

Perhaps it was a good thing to hold onto an idea. 

 

His heart beats like the fluttering of wings, a fast yet calculated rhythm. He has never known love so much as he has known pandemonium, never known light so much as he did endless night. But there is something blooming in his chest the way this flower defies all odds. A birdsong of want. 

 

* * *

Fili checks in on Kili, only to see Bofur leading him down a different path out of the oubliette. One that leads to the castle and not back the way that the king had asked.

 

* * *

Kili and Bofur walk through a tunnel lined with stone faces, the faces are long and remind Kili of Easter Island.

 

“Go back.” One of the stones talks as they pass, sand falling out if its mouth as it tries to heed a warning

 

“Turn around while you still can.” The voice is deep and trying too hard to sound ominous. 

 

“This is not the way.”

 

“Beware, beware.” 

 

“Soon it will be too late.” 

 

“Don’t pay them any mind, they’re just false alarms. You get a lot of them in the labyrinth, especially when you are on the right track.” Bofur waves his hand dismissively as they walk past another talking head. 

 

“Oh no you’re not.” One of the heads argues back.

 

“Oh shut up.” Bofur calls back behind his shoulder.

 

“Sorry, just doing my job.” The stone mutters back, it’s lips pouting since it’s warning wasn’t taken seriously.

 

“Well you don’t have to do it to us.” Bofur turns back around to glare at the stone before he continues on walking. 

 

They turn a corner and come across another stone, “for the,”

 

“-yeah yeah, we get it.” Bofur puts his hand up to silence the stone as they’re passing. 

 

“Oh come on, I haven’t done it in such a long time.” The stone cries out causing Bofur and Kili to stop in their tracks.

 

“It can’t be serious.” Kili whispers. 

 

“It is.”

 

“Fine, go ahead, but don’t expect a big reaction out of us.” Bofur crosses his arms and waits for the talking head to continue.

 

“No, no, of course not.” It clears it’s throat and continues on, “for the path you are taking will lead to sudden destruction.” The stone says it with a deep booming voice, more theatrics than Kili thinks are necessary. 

 

He rolls his eyes and when he looks at the ground after he notices a crystal ball rolling down the path they were on and past their feet. 

 

“Oh no,” Bofur whispers as they follow the crystal into a brick lined tunnel. The floor is still covered in dirt and sand and there is very little light save for the few holes in the ceiling that seem to be letting this realms sun in. 

 

The ball leaps into a cup of what appears to be a beggar, part man, part lion. He is crouched down on the ground, a large mask over his features and a lion’s mane attached to it. The man is wearing tight dandelion colored trousers and a low cut white blouse with a reddish orange cloak hanging over his shoulders.  

 

“Oh, what have we here?” His voice is a low growl as he rattles the crystal around in his cup. 

 

Bofur takes a step back, his hand reaching out instinctively in front of Kili to push him back. “Nothing, nothing at all.” 

 

Kili looks on in mesmerization at the lion mask, its ornate details. He sees blue behind the mask, the striking blue siren call of the king’s eyes. 

 

Their eyes meet, Fili looks at Kili, a wolf coiled in the corner, sharp features and teeth ready to be bared. For the both of them it feels as if the ground is moving, as if there a million trembling, shaking human knees causing the earth to quake. Mountains move and asteroids make impact on the earth's surface until is it stripped bare and left as pale and beauty marked as the moon. It feels as if the sun is finally expanding and asking to devour the world whole and the only thing that is left is the two of them, ready for judgement at each other’s hands. 

 

Fili rips the mask off with a lion's roar, careful not to show his shaking hands.”Nothing?! Nothing?! It certainly doesn’t look like nothing.” The Goblin King stands before them with his features on display and the mask tucked away somewhere in the king’s many tricks.

 

“Your majesty, what a lovely surprise.” Bofur takes a bow as he looks up at the king through his lashes. 

 

“Bogart.” The king says as he looks down at Bofur.

 

“Buffy.” Kili corrects him. 

 

“Bofur!” Bofur exclaims between them. 

 

“It looks as if you were helping him.” Fili tosses a crystal between his fingers as he leans against the wall to look at Bofur and Kili. He tries to keep his eyes focused away from Kili’s daring ones, how they beg to draw him in. 

 

“Helping? Helping? Me? Nah, I would never dream of it. I was taking him back to the beginning.” 

 

“What?!” Kili shouts as he looks at Bofur with knitted eyebrows. 

 

“If for one moment Bour,”

 

“Bofur,” Bofur takes a step back as the king advances on him

 

“-I thought that you were lying to me. I would be forced to hang you upside down above the bog of eternal stench.”

 

“No! I am not going to the bog!” Bofur exclaims as the king steps away from him and instead extends an arm towards the wall to lean on it. He gazes down at Kili.

 

“And you Kili, how are you enjoying my labyrinth.” 

 

Kili tightens his jaw and squares his shoulders, a habit he picked up from his uncle. “It’s easy, a piece of cake.” 

 

“Ugh,” Bofur groans out as he hits himself in the face with one of his hands. 

 

“Really now? How about upping the stakes then?” The king pulls back and materializes a golden clock in front of them. He spins the hands forward two hours. “So the labyrinth is a piece of cake is it? Let's see how you deal with this little slice?” He pulls a crystal up in his hands then tosses it down the dark tunnel in front of them. The crystal explodes and transforms into a large spinning machine with a spear head attached to the front of it, made to carve out tunnels and dig holes through rock. There are dozens of little blades spinning around on the front of the machine. The king smiles at Fili one last time, a lion smile, all teeth before he disappears. 

 

The wolf in Kili cries out to the bloodmoon of the king’s heart. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> someone save my tragic goblin king son


	5. King of Everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili was raised on northern wind and dark magic, on lies and half-truths.

“The cleaners!” Bofur shouts as the metal contraption comes barreling down the tunnel, blades attached to the front and wildly spinning. A machine made to tear through walls and dig tunnels.

 

“What?” Kili shouts back as they begin running from the pointed metal spear.

 

“The cleaners! The bog of eternal stench! You’ve really got his attention now kid!” Bofur and Kili reach a metal gate at the end of the tunnel. They shake the gate in an an attempt to get it open but see that there is a padlock around it.

 

Bofur pushes past Kili to the side and starts pushing at the wall.

 

“What are you doing?” Kili asks as he looks between Bofur and the the oncoming destruction.

 

“Push!”

 

Kili rushes to Bofur’s side and throws all of his weight into it. The wall collapses with Kili and Bofur landing on top.

 

The large spear head goes past them in the tunnel and breaks through the gate. As it goes past Kili sees that there is nothing behind the front face of the machine except for two goblins turning a crank.

 

“You gotta be fucking kidding me.” Kili mutters to himself as Bofur stands up and brushes himself off.

 

“Ah, this is what we need, a ladder. Follow me.” Bofur walks over to a ladder on the side of the wall. Kili stands up and crosses his arms.

 

“How am I supposed to trust you when you just told the Goblin King that you were taking me back to the beginning of the labyrinth?” Kili tries to ignore the crawl up his spine when he mentions the king, tries to ignore the way his skin pricks when he thinks of his blue eyes and their haunted look. He thinks it reminds him of home, the one he had when he was a child, back when his brother was still with them. They remind him of the waves there, a specific shade of blue. Not so dark that you couldn't see in the water but not bright enough that you could see through it. He remembers how the water changed during storms, how the blue faded to grey and he remembers the kings flashing eyes. He takes a deep breath at the thought, his insides twisting. He tightens his fingers around his waist as he looks up at Bofur who is grabbing the ladder.

 

“I wasn’t, I just told him that.” Bofur begins his descent up.

 

“Bofur, how can I believe anything that you say?” Kili calls up to him.

 

“Let me put it this way, what choice have you got?”

 

* * *

 

Fili stays in his sleeping quarters in the castle, away from the goblins who are carrying for the child. His mind is pulling at images, everything hazy and dim. He feels himself grasping, trying to find something to hold onto. The interaction with Kili has left him trembling. His hands shake as he grips on the sides of the mirror hanging in his room, a large ornate piece etched in gold swirls. He looks at his trembling bottom lip, his shaking hands and arms. He can barely recognize himself.

 

He can’t stop thinking about Kili’s wolf like features, of his sharp jaw and savage eyes, how they look like they could eat Fili raw.

 

A memory takes place, it comes to him in clarity, in the sound of a broken glass and a child’s sobs.

 

_For Kili’s third halloween they dressed up as Max from Where the Wild Things Are. He wore a white wolf costume and ran around the house growling at everyone and everything, a small golden paper crown resting atop his head._

 

_It stopped when he ran into the dining room table and their uncle’s mug went clattering to the floor._

 

_“I’m so sorry Uncle Thorin!” Kili had cried out, his hands going up into little wolf paws._

 

_“It’s alright Kili but perhaps you should go take off that costume and get ready for bed so we don’t have any more accidents tonight.” Thorin ran his hand through Kili’s hair messing it up with a fond smile on his face._

 

_He nodded his head and ran upstairs to his room. It was here where he laid on his bed, his pillow curled to his chest and sobs leaving his body._

 

_“Kee, what's wrong?” Fili had asked walking into the room and sitting on the edge of the bed.”_

 

_“I broke Uncle Thorin’s mug.”_

 

_“I’m sure it's fine Kee, he doesn’t seem mad about it.”_

 

_“But I broke it cause I wasn’t paying attention.” Kili let out another broken sob and a heavy sigh as he squeezed the pillow tighter._

 

_“Well no, I suppose wolf children don’t pay attention to things like tables in their way. Besides you’re the prince of the Wild Things and one day you will be their king. I don’t think they would want their king crying over something as small as a broken mug.” Fili rested his hand on Kili’s small waist._

 

_Kili sat up and looked at Fili with wide eyes. “Do you really think I could be king of the Wild Things?”_

 

_“I think you could be the king of all of the Wild Things, you could be king of anything.” Fili reached out and started tickling Kili’s sides. Kili squealed and went into a fit of laughter, his small legs kicking._

 

Fili gasps out, choking on fairytales, his hands trembling at the memory. “Thorin.” Fili remembers the word now, how Kili had spoken of it in the child’s bedroom. He wondered why it was so familiar to him.

 

Guilt rests in his collarbones, it sits in the hollow of his throat, it weighs down on his shoulders till he doesn’t know which way is up or down.

 

“Kili, Kili, Kili,” it rolls off of his tongue the way the wind howls in the winter. He repeats his brothers name till his hands even out, till his voice stops breaking. It’s his tether, the thing to keep him from slipping further into this dark enchanted realm.

 

Fili was raised on northern wind and dark magic, on lies and half-truths. He can’t explain the storm in his bone marrow, how the tsunami swirls inside of him. He knows that Kili is his brother, the same way that he knows that there are many realms beyond his own, the same way that he knows the outside sky is blue and that apples are red.

 

He can’t explain the thing clawing inside of him, pulling at his tongue. All he can think of is Kili and this need to feel the heat of him. The cold of his bones and how they ache to be tender, syrupy sweet. There’s something about Kili’s gaze, the way that he holds himself, fierce and brave. Fili thinks that maybe Kili was always meant to be a king, with his long fingers and broad shoulders. He smiles at the thought of a crown upon his head, raven black and compelling.

 

* * *

 

“What so bad about The Bog of Eternal Stench anyway? Is that all it does, is smell?” Kili pulls himself up the ladder behind Bofur.

 

“If you smelled The Bog of Eternal Stench then you would understand. That’s all it takes, one whiff.” Bofur shudders at the thought.

 

Bofur pushes aside the grate at the top of the ladder and steps out. “Here we are, this is where we part ways.”

 

Kili climbs out behind him only to realize that they are climbing out of a vase in a garden of the labyrinth and not a tunnel. He looks down underneath the vase to see that there is nothing but empty space and tries not to wrap his head around the physics of it. 

 

“Wait, what do you mean part ways?” Kili looks at Bofur, his eyebrows pinched together.

 

“You don’t want me around anyways, don’t trust me. So I might as well go.” Bofur does an over dramatic sigh and begins to walk away.

 

“No, no, no, You’re helping me.” Kili reaches and grabs Bofur’s hat, pulling it off of his head and holding it above his own. Bofur jumps up to try to reach but is just a few inches away, his fingers barely grasping. “I’m done with all these little tricks, just help me get my cousin back. I just need to take him home, you don’t understand what it will do to my uncles, especially Thorin, he’s already lost a nephew, I would hate to think what losing his son would do.”

 

Bofur pauses, taking a moment to think about his next step. “When you say he lost a nephew, do you mind me asking what the child’s name was.”

 

“Fili, his name was Fili and he was my brother.” Kili feels a pang in his chest as saying Fili’s name. For years his name only brought an emptiness to it but now it feels like a claw gripping around his heart and pulling.

 

Bofur nods his head. “Alright, I’ll keep helping but we have to try to stay out of the king’s way. He has eyes everywhere.”

 

Kili holds out a hand, giving Bofur his hat back. Bofur snatches it quickly and places it tightly on his head. The flaps still stick up at the sides and Kili can’t help but smile at the sight of it. He kind of thought for the brief moment that Bofur didn’t have it on that he looked a bit strange without it.

 

With exact conformation that this is the king’s brother Bofur knows that the rest of their task will be dangerous, but perhaps Kili could be the key to saving their current king from the madness that tears at his mind. Every king had eventually changed over time, thousands of years for the magic of the realm to shape them, for the magic to work its way like a sickness, malignant and unstoppable. Perhaps it could be slowed, perhaps it could be _shared._ The idea keeps spinning in Bofur’s mind.

 

“It will be a challenge to not have the king see you in his own realm.” An older voice breaks between them. They both look over to see an elderly man with thick grey robes sitting on a stone chair. His hair is long, with a beard to match it, his hair is also gray and there seems to be a brown bird resting atop his gray hat. Kili thinks besides the bird that he looks every bit human.

 

“Pardon?” Kili asks again.

 

“It will be a challenge to not have the king see you in his own realm, you are a fool to think otherwise.” The old man closes his eyes and relaxes back into his chair.

 

“What’s your name?” Kili asks as he steps forward.

 

The man opens his eyes, one at a time then smiles softly. There is something gentle about him, something out of place in this strange maze. “Gandalf, and this fellow on my hat would be Radagast.”

 

“I’m Kili, and this here is my friend Bofur.” Kili indicates to the small man next to him. Bofur looks up at him with a confused look. “Do you think that you could help point us in the direction of the Goblin City?”

 

“Of course my dear fellow! Sometimes the way forward is the way back.” Gandalf smiles at him then closes his eyes once more.

 

“Will you listen to this crap?” Radagast says from his perch atop the hat and Kili looks up startled at him.

 

“Quiet you.” Gandalf taps his hat and shakes the bird.

 

“Do you know the way?” Kili asks again.

 

“You want to get to the castle at the center of the labyrinth?” The old man says, stating the obvious and Kili tries his hardest not to be impatient but the thought of the hours sped up on the clock looms in the back of his mind.

 

“How is that for brain power?” Radagast laughs and Gandalf slaps his hat once more.

 

“Alright young man, sometimes the way forward is the way back.” Gandalf repeats himself which results in Radagast rolling his eyes and letting out a heavy sigh.

 

“Will you be quiet?!” He shouts up to the bird who has its eyes focused on the sky. Gandalf waits a moment for a response from the bird.

 

“Yes.” Radagast says it long and drawn out.

 

“Quite often, it seems as if we are not getting anywhere when in fact-”

 

“-we are,” Radagast cuts Gandalf off resulting in the old man staring up at his hat as if the bird can see through the thick fabric.

 

“We are.” Gandalf says firmly, ignoring that the bird had just spoken for him.

 

Gandalf closes his eyes again, leaning back on his stone seat. Within a moment his mouth is parted and light breaths are coming from his mouth.

 

“Is he asleep?” Kili asks Radagast in amazement.

 

“Afraid so. Won't be getting much more out of him.”

 

“It’s not like I got a lot to begin with.” Kili says blatantly, not caring for the antics of the creatures inside of the labyrinth.

 

“That's the lot of it!” Radagast exclaims.

 

“Well thanks anyways, I guess?” Kili shrugs and grabs Bofur by the shoulder to lead them out of the garden. “That was a waste of time.”

 

“Yeah and it’s not like you have a lot of it.” Bofur says walking in front of Kili. They start their way through the labyrinth again, this time the walls are completely made of hedges and Kili is grateful for the change in scenery. It's the only part of the maze so far where Kili has seen any kind of plant life. Anything that wasn’t barren branches or fungus on the bricks.

 

“Why did you say that?” Bofur asks, not wanting to turn around and see the young man’s face.

 

“Say what?”

 

“That word, friend.” It has been many centuries since Bofur had heard such a word, especially to have it directed at him. He feels his throat closing up at the thought of it. His mind trying to push away green rolling hills and damp grass. They are faint things to him, barely a glimpse of a former life. They feel more like an almost forgotten dream than an actual memory.

 

“Well you’re the closest thing I have to one in this place.” Kili runs a hand along one of the hedges, feeling the green leaves under his fingers. The leaves feel waxy under his skin and Kili pulls off one of the leaves and crushes it between his fingers.

 

“They’re fake.” He says in wonder as he pulls another leaf off.

 

“Of course they are, plants don’t so well here. I’m sure you noticed the beginning of the labyrinth. Not a thing alive but weeds.” Bofur pushes all thoughts of the word ‘friend’ out of his mind, along with all thoughts of a place he used to call home.

 

“I’m not even gonna ask how these got here.” Kili drops the leaves on the ground and continues walking. He wonders though if it was this new king or the one before. He faintly has a memory, something to do with his brother. He remembers seeing Autumn for the first time, the barren trees. He remembers thinking that it meant the trees and bushes were dead and that they were now a graveyard. He remembers clinging onto Fili's leg, his small hands as they gripped tightly. 

 

" _Are they dead forever?" Kili had asked, hiding behind Fili as he looked out into the empty woods. Branches that looked like skeletons blew in the breezes, reaching out towards him like hands wanting to grab._

 

_"No they aren't. Spring will come and we will see the trees bloom together. They'll be filled with color again." Fili had smiled down at him._

 

Fili didn't see that Spring with Kili. 

 

He kind of likes the idea that this king would want to put plants here. Maybe this king thought that all of the desolate trees and vines empty of green were just as haunting. He can’t ignore the pounding in his chest, something akin to want. He shakes his head slightly, trying to dispel the image of the king from his mind. Trying to push away the golden waves, the expanse of his chest, sweat and sinew, the low cut of his shirt and the thick amber hair underneath. He takes a moment to imagine the king against him, the snake of him against his tongue. Kili’s breath hitches and he shakes his head as if it will clear his mind.

 

He grabs another leaf from the fake hedge and rips it in half as a distraction. “This place is starting to mess with my mind.” He says it more to himself than anything but he hopes that saying it out loud will make it the true. That it is the work of the labyrinth and not his own desire.

 

They make a few turns until Kili hears a noise like hooves against the cement tiles. “Do you hear that?”

 

“No, don’t hear a thing.”

 

A noise breaks out like a howl among them, an sound of anguish from what sounds like an animal.

 

“What was that?” Kili asks quietly as he ducks behind one of the ledges. Bofur lets out a sigh, the noise familiar to him.

 

“That would be my cousin, Bifur.”

  



	6. Juxtaposition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kili leans down and presses his forehead to Fili’s shoulders and Fili wants the magic of the realm to explain why it feels like the most natural thing.

“Cousin?” Kili asks as he looks a Bofur who is walking slowly along the edge of the hedge to the sounds of the noise.

 

“Aye, cousin.” They reach an opening to see four small goblins, no more than four feet in height wearing spiked armor, their bodies covered head to toe. They stand around a large creature that Kili thinks looks similar to a cave yeti or perhaps a cross between the abominable snowman and a giant dog. The creature has long red fur and two horns coming out of it’s head. It hangs upside down from a tree, it’s feet tangled in rope. The goblins stand around him, using strange sticks with smaller creatures attached to them that have sharp teeth. The sticks bite at him as the creature grunts and screams. 

 

“We should get him down,” Kili says as he looks around the area for something to throw.

 

“Ey!” Bofur shouts as he steps out into the open. The four guards turn on him instantly.

 

“That’s not what I had in mind!” Kili hisses through his teeth.

 

“Too late now!” Bofur shouts back. “They don’t seem so big, we can take ‘em.” 

 

“They’re literally the same size as you.” Kili says back. The goblins are looking between the two of them bantering, confusion as to what should be happening. “I wish I had something to throw,” Kili looks around at the ground around him and notices a few rocks the size of his fist lining the hedge. He picks one up and pegs the closest guard in the head. Their helmet spin and closes over their eyes. It runs around aimlessly, the stick it was holding facing forawrd, jaw and teeth snapping from the creature on the end of it. It bites into another guard, teeth digging into flesh and doesn’t let go.

 

Kili picks up another rock and tosses it hard enough to knock the third guard out. The fourth one looks at the chaos unfolding and runs out of the garden area.  The other two take each other out, leaving the space free for Kili and Bofur to walk up to the creature.

 

“You said he’s your cousin?” Kili asks as he examines the knot in the rope.

 

“He is.” Bofur walked up to Bifur, his hand resting on his head. 

 

“How did that happen?” Kili starts working on the knot.

 

“I didn’t make it through the labyrinth in time.” Bofur’s voice is quiet and filled with sorrow as he looks at his cousin and the state that he is in. Kili stops working on the knot as the words sink in. 

 

“You asked for the Goblin King’s help?” Kili turns to look down at Bofur who is smiling gently at Bifur, running a hand through the creature's long hair.

 

“And I’ve regretted it every day since.” 

 

“Bofur,  _ friend.” _ The creature says, it’s voice deep, syllables coming out slowly. He lifts a large paw and reaches out to touch Bofur.

 

Bofur chokes out a laugh, tears welling at his eyes. “I believe he heard us talking. He doesn’t know a lot of words, not since turning into this beast.” Bofur shakes his head lightly in an attempt to push away the emotions building up inside of him. 

 

“Well, let's get him untied and we can all be on our way. Looks like you’re coming with us Bifur.” The creature lets out what Kili assumes to be an excited noise. Kili looks around to see that the rope is tied to the trunk of one of the many artificial plants in this section in the labyrinth. He rushes over to it, loosening the knot enough that Bifur goes crashing to the ground. Bofur undoes the ties around his legs and arms.

 

Bifur stands next to him, a looming nine feet not counting the horns sticking from his head. His mouth remains open as two bottom fangs jut out of it, too large for his mouth to be closed. 

 

“Bofur, friend.” Bifur repeats as he takes a paw to pat his cousin on the head. 

 

“Not a very good one.” Bofur mutters under his breath with a sad smile.

 

Bifur shakes his head in disagreement and repeats himself, “Bofur, friend.”

 

“Alright, alright. Let's get going, shall well?” Bofur takes a step forward only to watch as the garden walls shift from hedges to bricks and for two large doors to appear before them. “Oh no.” His whispers to himself as Kili approaches the doors. A large gargoyle style knocker rests on each door, the left one with a large brass knocker through the ears and the right one with a brass knocker through its mouth.

 

“It’s very rude to stare!” The left knocker shouts at him as Kili takes a step back.

 

“It's no gmood askming him!” The other knocker muffles through the knocker in its mouth.

 

“Don’t talk with your mouthful.” The left knocker rolls its eyes in frustration. 

 

Kili walks over to the right knocker and pulls hard on the knocker, the ring sleeping free of the gargoyle’s mouth.

 

“It's no good talking to him, he's deaf as a post!” The voice is rough and deep, thicker than Bofur’s and reminds Kili of the highlands in Scotland. 

 

“You’re such a wonderful conversationalist brother.” The left knocker speaks again and Kili realizes their predicament. Another set of siblings trapped in the labyrinth. He tries not to focus on this fact and instead turns back to Bofur and Bifur.

 

“Which one do we chose out of these two ugly characters?”

 

“We have names! Balin-”

 

“-and Dwalin.”

 

“At your service.” The knockers say in unison. 

 

“Does that mean you know which way leads to the castle?”

 

“Aye, that we do.” The one known as Dwalin states. 

 

“Where do these doors lead then?” Kili asks looking between the knockers. 

 

“That one goes to the Mirkwood.” Balin rolls his eyes in a motion over towards Dwalin.

 

“The Mirkwood?” 

 

“I don’t think that's a good idea Kili,” Bofur cuts in.

 

“Why not?”

 

“The Mirkwood is a poisonous forest.”

 

“When you say poisonous do you mean it's actually filled with poison or,” Kili puts his arms up in a shrugging motion, knowing that in this place that a poisonous forest could be a very literal thing.

 

“I mean that all of it’s trees are dead and it is home to strange creatures, stranger than these two here.” Bofur tosses a thumb up indicating to the knockers.

 

“But will it be faster?” 

 

“Aye, it is a shortcut.” Dwalin answers. 

 

“Then let's go that way.” Kili walks over to the door that Dwalin rests upon and notices that there is not a handle or a way to push it open.

 

“You have to put the knocker back in his mouth. Knock and the door will open.” Balin says with a smug smile. Pleased that the knocker will have to go back in the other one’s mouth. 

 

“Sorry mate.” Kili says as he goes to put the knocker back in Dwalin’s mouth. Dwalin presses his lips together making it impossible for Kili to put the knocker back in. “Oh come on!” Kili takes a hand and pinches Dwalin’s nose so the knocker can’t breathe. After a minute Dwalin lets out a large exhale. Kili pops the knocker back in then knocks twice. The door swings open to them.

 

Kili is the first to step through, the ground is covered in rotting leaves in varying shades of brown, grey, and black.The branches on the trees are completely barren, the bark in shades of gray with white moss growing on them.

 

“Everything in this forest is dead. It has been for a very long time. It is much like the one on the outskirts of the labyrinth.” Bofur says walking behind Kili, staying close to the young man’s frame.

 

“There’s a forest outside of the labyrinth?”

 

“Yes, and possibly much more beyond it. But things in this realm have held a dark magic to them for thousands of years. I do not think that they will ever be as they once were.” Bofur is mindful of his steps as he walks along the forest floor.

 

“Perhaps if we had visitors more often than the forest wouldn’t seem so bleak.”

 

Kili looks up for the source of the noise to see a creature in the trees. It has long thin limbs, pointed ears and sharp features. The creature is covered in long white hair and white feathers mixed in along with piercing dark eyes. Kili takes a step back only to realize there is another similar creature down by his feet, this one with blue eyes and another with green eyes and red hair. 

 

“What the-”

 

“We’re creatures of the realm. I am Thranduil,”

 

“Legolas.” The one with blue eyes grins mouthful of teeth up at Kili.

 

“Tauriel.” The red haired creature says with a dramatic sigh as she tentatively reaches out to touch the denim of Kili’s jeans.

 

“Whoa!” Kili takes a step back away from her touch.

 

“And unlike some of the monstrosities of the labyrinth, we are not at your service.” The bird like creature known as Thranduil walks up to Kili, walking around him slowly and taking in his size and shape. “Perhaps though, you should stay with us a while, get some rest. Have a bit of fun. You look so tense.”

 

“Yes! Stay with us awhile.”

 

“Stay with us.” They’re all moving around quickly, their hair and feathers fluttering in excitement.

 

“Do not eat or drink anything in here. Let’s just get going.” Bofur tugs on Kili’s shirt as he tries to pull him away from the bird-like goblins. 

 

“No fun! No fun! No fun!” The three of them start chanting as Kili, Bofur, and Bifur try to make their way out of the clearing between the trees and to the footpath. 

 

Thranduil steps in front of them. He removes his eyes from their sockets and then swallows them down before spitting them out and letting them roll across the forest floor. “No dice. You can leave when I say.”

 

Legolas takes off his head and tosses it in the air before catching it and reattaching it to its body. 

 

“Uh, Kili, how are we,” Bofur starts to ask before Kili takes Legolas’ head and tosses it out into the woods.

 

“Run!” Kili shouts and the three of them start dashing out of the clearing and to the path, their feet pick up as they run over tree roots and fallen branches. Kili laughs, his breath heavy as he rushes with branches pushing past him. He ducks and weaves his way through the woods until he reaches a wall in the labyrinth. Bofur is right behind him and when Kili looks back he sees that Bifur is gone.

 

“Where is Bifur?” 

 

“Who knows, I’m sure he’s fine though. Wouldn’t worry about him too much with him being so big and all.” Bofur leans over, his hands on his knees as he tries to catch his breath. 

 

Kili sees the creatures catching up to them, he looks back to the wall and sees a rope is now dangling from the top of it.

 

“That wasn’t there a moment ago.” Kili goes to pull the rope to see how stable it is.

 

“The king clearly doesn’t want you in this part of the labyrinth.” Bofur says as he pushes Kili to start climbing up the rope.

 

Kili doesn’t ask why but he finds it very strange. He thinks that if the king didn’t want him reaching the castle then the Mirkwood would be the perfect place for him to get trapped. 

 

Once they are over the top of the wall they reach the other side of the forest. Its bark isn’t covered in the same white moss and Kili notices that the greenery that is on this side is made of the same waxy substance as the hedges. He lets out a sigh of relief, realizing that this side may be a bit safer. If he can even call it that. 

 

“Do you not like the labyrinth Kili? I thought that it was giving purpose to your aimless wandering in life.” The Goblin King stands against a tree, a foot resting casually against it. He tosses a peach up in the air and then catches it. 

 

“What?” Kili asks stunned as he takes the king in, his long hair in waves and a strange metal shoulder pad on his coat as if he was going into battle. 

 

“Do you feel as if you have a purpose?” The king as he kicks his foot off of the tree and walks over to Kili.

 

Kili squares his shoulders and stands up straight and for the first time he realizes that he is taller than the king. The king’s eyes look Kili up and down curiously, waiting for a response.

 

Kili feels the weight of the king’s words and the truth to them. He doesn’t know how to say that for years he has felt so lost. That he has been spending his time making others happy because he doesn’t know what to do with himself otherwise. He doesn’t know how to say that for a majority of his life that it has felt like something really important was missing inside of him and that when he stepped into the labyrinth that hollowness stopped feeling as if it were spreading. 

 

“I,” he pauses, not able to find the need to have a witty remark, “how did you know?” 

 

“I knew your mind before I knew your face.” Fili wants to reach out, wants his knuckles to graze Kili’s cheek, to see how is skin would feel. He refrains himself. Instead he tosses his peach one more time before taking a bite and handing it out to Kili. 

 

Kili wants to ask the king what he means, but the fruit in his hands is tempting. 

 

“It’s safe, I promise. It’s not tainted like what the creatures in the Mirkwood tried to give you. I just took a bite myself. You must be hungry, it’s the least I can do.” Fili smiles gently as Kili, the tender flesh of the peach in his hands. 

 

Kili takes the peach out of the king’s hand, his fingers brush against Fili’s. He brings the fruit up to his lips, the sticky sweetness of it thick against his tongue. He takes a bite and instantly the world starts to spin.

 

Suddenly he’s three years old again and standing on his bed, his arms outstretched ready to jump into his brother's arms, jumping into blue eyes. 

 

Kili looks at the king, into the same blue eyes. 

 

His eyes close before he can speak, his knees give out. Fili catches him and lays him gently on the ground. 

 

“What have you done?” Bofur asks looking up at the king.

 

“Stalling him, since you couldn’t.” Fili allows himself this, this small moment where Kili can’t deny him. He touches his brother’s cheek. He savors the sugar sweet peach on his tongue knowing that the same flavor is on Kili’s. “You were leading him straight towards me, I thought I would meet you in the middle.” 

 

Fili stands up, looming in his height compared to Bofur. “Watch over him, he should wake within a few hours.”

 

“And then what?” 

 

“See if he reaches me.”

  
  


* * *

Fili returns to his castle, his hands shaking as he goes to his crystals. He lifts them up, three of them in his hands as he spins them around. He goes to his open window and in each crystal he places a memory and sends them out into the labyrinth to reach Kili.

 

* * *

Today is different for Fili. 

 

His interminably repetitive days are temporarily over. The only thing that kept his mind from atrophying was the thought of Kili, Kili out there in the world growing up without him. 

 

What if he was scared?

 

Was he looking the way that Fili was?

 

Did he look at the sunrises and sunsets and think that they all held the same shades the way that Fili did? 

 

Fili wants to know all of these things but he is afraid to learn the answers. 

 

* * *

Kili wakes in a dream. He looks around to see that is in a room filled with dozens of people, all of them dressed up and wearing masquerade masks.

 

A mirror hangs to the wall and Kili rushes over to it to see how much his appearance has changed. He wakes to see that he is dressed in a black suit, more to that fitting of the 1800s but there are tweaks to it. There are large shoulder pads, each one with a long claw resting against feathers protruding off the side of it. The collar goes all the way up his chin, a white frilled ascott hangs on top. The black suit is lined with gold stitching and emblems. 

 

He touches the mask that he is wearing, the face of a wolf. The mask cuts off at the tip of his nose, leaving his lips and jaw free. The black mask is carved delicately, sharp ears and eyes. done the front and around the eyes the mask if lined with small gold strips to accent the features. 

 

He is mesmerized by it, by the striking contrast of gold against black.

 

Through the mirror he sees a break in the crowd, a gold mask standing out among them.

 

Kili turns around and sees a lions mask. Similar to his own, only to the tip of the nose. This mask is plated in all gold, the ears on the mask resembling small wings. He can see the blue eyes through them, he knows those blue eyes. 

 

He knows them from the tunnel, from the king. He knows them from being a child and crying on his bed, sobbing into his pillow and looking into his brother's eyes,  _ “you could be the king of anything.” _

 

“You could you know.” The king’s voice carries across the ballroom and the people part for him. He stands, waiting for Kili’s move. 

 

Kili walks towards him, his feet carrying him. He feels heavy, weighed down as if he’s in a trance. 

 

Kili reaches him, he notices the well trimmed beard visible from the bottom of the mask. Two gold fangs hang down from the bottom. The king is dressed in all white, his suit similar to Kili’s with gold adorning it. 

 

Fili reaches out his hand for Kili to take it. 

 

There’s no hesitation when Kili’s hand closes in his. Fili pulls him close, music playing around them as the room fills with noise again. He’s close enough now to see the constellation kissed skin of Kili’s cheeks.

 

“Fili.” His body trembles when Kili says his name. He always wondered how the vowels would sound rolling off of Kili’s tongue, how they would come across in his lilt. “Fili.”

 

“Kee.” Fili tightens his hands around Kili’s, not able to find the words he wants to say.

 

Kili lets out a choked noise, a half sob of a thing. “No one has ever called me that but you.” He’s smiling and Fili feels as if he could fall into it. That he could live in that wide smile of Kili’s and be content to stay there forever. 

 

Kili leans down and presses his forehead to Fili’s shoulders and Fili wants the magic of the realm to explain why it feels like the most natural thing. 

 

He pulls back, his face a little more serious. “You asked me out in the woods, if your labyrinth gave purpose to my aimless wandering. But I have a question for you, what weighs on you, the magic of the realm or your heart?” 

 

Fili steps back, putting a little space between him and Kili. He keeps their hands entwined like vines, too afraid to let him go completely. “I don’t know what you mean.”

 

“You’re a whirlwind of conflict, I see it in how you carry yourself. I know you Fili. I don’t care that we’ve been seperated for fifteen years,”

 

“Three hundred.” Fili corrects him.

 

“What?”

 

“It’s been three hundred for me.” Fili shuffles on his feet, his normal commanding demeanor stripped bare in front of his brother. 

 

“Fee I’m,”

 

“Don’t, please. I have spent every day since I became king looking for you. Please don’t say you’re sorry for me. Please Kee, just let me have this one thing. Let me have this dream.” Fili pleads with him, his voice breaks on his last word, his eyes searching Kili's.

 

This is not at all Kili had ever imagined finding his brother.

 

Kili nodes his head in agreement, his tongue still heavy and sticky with the taste of the poisoned fruit. “Ok, if I can give this to you then I will.” 

 

Fili pulls him close, he wraps an arm around Kili’s waist and keeps the other with their fingers wrapped together. 

 

Their hearts beat, synchronized in a pounding rhythm. Kili looks for something to say. 

 

“What do you do here? What do you do when you are not fulfilling your role as the Goblin King?” Kili rests his head on his chest, allowing himself to relax into the warm touch. He tries not to notice how it feels. He wonders if Fili knew it would feel this way, like he finally felt like he belonged and wondered if that's why he asked for him to have this moment.

 

“I talk to the stars.” He wants to tell Kili everything. He wants him the way that clouds break to let the sun through. 

 

“What do you tell them?”

 

“Everything. I tell them how I am lonely. I tell them how I miss you and hope that they tell you. I tell them everything that I can’t say because I have no one to say it to.” Fili’s voice is soft, is fills Kili’s ears and his bloodstream. With each exhale he has, Kili inhales, taking him all in.

 

“What do you tell them about me?” Kili looks up at Fili’s smile, the juxtaposition of it compared to the sadness in his eyes. It’s an enigma that Kili feels he could get wrapped up in. 

 

“I’ll tell you what I want to tell them. I want to tell them what I feel for you but I’m afraid that if I do then they will fall for you the same as I did, and the sky will be left empty and I will be alone once more.” He feels safe here in this dreamscape with Kili in his arms. He wishes that it wasn’t a dream, that Kili wasn’t under the influence of the fruit. He knows that when Kili wakes he will most likely forget this dream and if he doesn’t then Fili fears he will be too ashamed to have Fili, too ashamed to call him his brother, too ashamed to allow himself to love someone barely human. A creature in a realm full of monsters with nowhere to call home. 

 

Kili pulls back and looks up at Fili. He knows that this is his brother but he can’t ignore the war waging in his mind. He wants to reach up and feel Fili’s full bottom lip, he wants to touch it lightly, gossamer and delicate. A whisper of a thing just to see how it feels under his skin.

 

“I don’t want you to be alone.” The words are loose on his tongue but he knows them to be true. The soft edges in Kili’s voice sound too much like hope to Fili.

 

Fili thinks himself a firefly, small and flickering with a light that could never match the suns. He feels so small in this moment, insignificant compared to Kili’s words that speak moonbeam intimacy. 

 

As Kili looks at him he knows that if he falls in love with him that he will fall out of love with the world. That nothing will compare to what is in front of him, nothing will compare to the dangerous promise of what Fili holds. He wants this narrow kind of love, single minded and filled with just one person. He wants to remember how it feels to fall asleep with his head in Fili’s lap. 

 

All of a sudden he hates the world, he hates it because Fili has never heard the quiet streets at night when there are no cars. He has never laid in bed listening to the silence and comparing it to other towns. He’s never seen the sodium glow of the streetlights and how they cast shadows on newly paved roads.

 

He doesn’t know the way that Fili’s voice would sound by saying, _ ‘the sun's coming up’ _ , because they spent the night on the roof looking out of a telescope. He’s never made coffee with Kili, never sat across the kitchen table from him as adults. He’s never read newspaper headlines and felt his heart ache at the smudged black ink. That he doesn’t know how Kili likes to sleep on couches because he can’t handle the vast open space his bed has to offer, that he would rather feel the coffee table pressing into his knee.

 

Kili’s body has never known a battlefield, one made of war or one made from love. It has only known complacency. But with Fili’s skin touching his it happens like a nuclear bomb. All of sudden his skin is made for war, his flesh is battlefields and his hands are writing textbooks of history.

 

He remembers everything Fili has ever told him and he breaks at a certain memory. It’s enough to pull him out of his fascination, out of his enchantment with the king in front of him.

 

“When I was three, we drew a map, listen,” Fili looks away as Kili talks and Kili reaches up to pull him back, his fingers resting on his jaw,”- and we had wooden swords. We ran into the background claiming we were looking for lost treasure. What did you promise me? What did you promise me on those made up waters, on that dangerous sea filled with krakens and mermaids?” Kili reaches up now, his hand touching Fili’s mask, his fingers hesitant to lift it.

 

“I don’t remember.” Fili whispers, he wants to turn away in shame but his eyes stay locked on Kili’s gaze. 

 

“Yes you do, if I remember then you can remember. What did you promise me?”

 

“That I would always protect you.” He sees the wilds in Kili’s eyes, endless plains and promises. 

 

Kili slowly takes off Fili’s mask to see his features fully. His fingers rest on Fili’s cheek and when Fili smiles up at him Kili touches the dimple there. He thinks his finger fits perfectly in the indentation. He also thinks it's the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. He wants to stay in this dreamscape, in this world built for them. He doesn’t care about the strange costumes, he just wants to rest in his brother's arms. He knows he can’t, he can’t have this. He can’t let his mistake turn a child into one of the goblins in the realm. 

 

“I made that same promise to my cousin. I have to save Frodo, I have to. I’m sorry.” Kili breaks away from Fili. He takes a large wooden chair and smashes it against the mirror. The shards go flying, the mirror shattering like Fili’s false sense of security in Kili’s arms.

 

Kili wakes up from his dream gasping.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh here's fan art that I based their costumes/masks off of, from the beaut skylocked who drew me halloween art a few months back, you can check it out [here.](http://skylocked.tumblr.com/tagged/halloween-art) Loads better than my description.


	7. Star Crossed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are growing roots in his heart and forests on his hands and forgiveness in his blood.

Kili wakes with a start, his heart hammering in his chest. He looks over to see Bofur sitting on a tree stump, his hat in his hands as he plays with the fur lining.

 

“Kili, you’re finally awake!” Bofur sits up and puts his hat back on as he walks over to Kili who is pushing himself off the ground, dirt and damp leaves stuck to his skin. Kili brushes himself off, looking around for an exist out of the forest. 

 

“I have to get to the castle, I have to get Frodo, I have to talk to Fili, I have-”

 

The ground collapses beneath him, dirt giving way to a trap. Kili’s back hits the hard compacted earth of the tunnel and goes sliding. He can see light ahead and it looks as if there is a long drop at the end of it. His quick eyes catch roots sticking out at the end of the tunnel, he grabs hold of them as his body jerks and he swings himself to the left, his feet catching on corroding bricks. He notices that it is the other side of the labyrinth wall directly beneath him is a swamp.

 

“Oh me hat!” Bofur shouts as he grabs hold of his hat and Kili grabs hold of his arm, pulling him close. They both lose their balance for a moment, swinging on the root as their feet try to find purchase again on the side of the castle wall. 

 

“What did you do to upset the king?! We’re in the Bog of Eternal Stench!” Bofur groans.

 

“Is that was this awful place is? I thought that was just a really misplaced name, I didn’t think that it was actually the truth.” Kili scrunches up his face in disgust in an attempt not to breathe the foul air. He grips onto the wall and starts moving along the ledge and towards the bank of the swamp.

 

“What do you mean? I told you what this place was!” 

 

“Well, yeah, but I thought it was an over exaggeration. I didn’t think I would have to take it so literal.” Kili sticks his tongue out to gag but immediately regrets his decision. He closes his mouth and squints his eyes. “I think I might actually die here.” 

 

“I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone.”

 

As they get to the end of the ledge, the last of the stones collapses from under them and goes rolling onto the bog. Kili and Bofur shout as the fall onto the embankment of the bog. Only they long on something very large and covered in fur instead.

 

“Bifur!” Kili exclaims as he stands up, excited to see another familiar face in the maze. “Where did Bofur go?” Kili looks around the area and sees two feet sticking out from under the large creature. The feet start kicking and Kili can hear Bofur’s muffled cries. 

 

“Smells.” Bifur says as he takes a large paw to wave it in front of his face.

 

“Can’t disagree with you there.” Kili pulls on the beast's arm to help him stand up. Bofur comes running out from underneath him, adjusting his hat. 

 

“He did that on purpose.” Bofur says narrowing his eyes.

 

“Yeah well maybe he has a right to.” Kili say as he finishes dusting himself off. 

 

Bofur doesn’t say anything more on the matter. They walk along the edge of the bog, on their way to a bridge up ahead. 

 

“When we were up in the forest and you had just woken up, you called the king by his name.” It’s not a question, Bofur keeps his eyes on the young man in front of him. He watches how his shoulders tense and his feet pause. 

 

“Yeah, I learned his name when I was asleep. There was,” Kili pauses, running a hand over his face before he keeps going, “-there was a dream, he was there.” 

 

“It wasn’t a dream, well partially. The fruit was drugged which made your mind more susceptible to be entered.”

 

Kili turns, “entered? Don’t say it like that. Say probed. Wait, don’t say that either.” 

 

Bofur laughs at Kili’s mild panic over the choice of word. “What did the king tell you when he was in your dream then?” 

 

Kili thinks of how to phrase it, a way to say that he met him in a dream but loves him like a nightmare. Instead he settles on his, “he’s my brother.” 

 

* * *

Fili is brought back to himself. He stands in his bedroom chamber, hands gripping the dresser in front of the golden mirror that hangs. His eyes bring back the image of Kili shattering the mirror in the dream to escape. He pushes back away from the dresser and goes over to a small wooden chair in the corner. He picks it up, fingers clenching around the arms of it. The outside world sings to him, calls to him from his confines, his own dark mythology. He takes a breath before throwing it at the mirror. Shards go flying into the air, scattering across the stone floor.

 

The scene doesn’t break. 

 

He thinks of Kili’s betrayal. 

 

If he can call it that. His mind works against him. He wants to think that if their roles were reversed then he would have done the same as Kili but he can’t find the place in his heart that this feeling should be resting. 

 

He sits down in defeat, picking up a shard from the mirror and turning it in his hands. He grabs it tightly, letting the piece break his flesh. He loves Kili, loves him more than he should

 

They’re double crossing, star-crossed, fingers crossed kind of love. 

 

Fili has spent so long dreaming about the stars that he has forgotten about the ones burning in himself. He won't give up on Kili. He will no longer be a king in his own labyrinth with his palace of lonely, just him and his heartbreak.

 

His fist unfolds from the shard like a flower in bloom. There are growing roots in his heart and forests on his hands and forgiveness in his blood. 

* * *

 

 

“You don’t seem too shocked.” Kili says as he looks at Bofur. They’ve reached the edge of the bog and are standing in front of a small bridge. The bridge is a single plank of wood that looks as if it has seen its time. 

 

“I guessed as much.”

 

“You just guessed? Just like that? ‘Oh that boy must be his brother’.” 

 

“Your names are almost identical! I told you when you first got here that he’s been looking for someone that matches your description! It wasn’t exactly the most trying problem in my life!” Bofur shouts as he throws his hands up in the air. 

 

“You don’t have to yell.” Kili feigns offense as he turns to start walking across the bridge. 

 

“Stop! Stop what you are doing!” A small talking dog, running on its hind legs approaches the bridge. The dog wears a waistcoat and a large hat with a feather in it, there is an eyepatch over one of it’s eyes and he waves around a small staff. 

 

“You gotta move, we gotta get out of this place. The stench is unbearable.” Kili says as he looks down at the small dog.

 

“Stench. O’ what speakest thou?” The dog sniff the air. 

 

“Is he really talking like Shakespeare?” Kili turns to look at Bofur.

 

“Who’s Shakespeare?” Bofur asks looking between Kili and the dog. 

 

Kili wonders how long Bofur has been in this place. 

 

“I smell nothing.” The dog proclaims waving his scepter around.

 

“You’re joking.” Bofur tugs at the flaps on his hat in frustration. 

 

“I live by my sense of smell. The air is sweet and fragrant and none may pass without my permission.”

 

“Smell bad.” Bifur shakes his head and waves his paw once more to indicate the stench.

 

“Oh just get out of our way.” Bofur tries to push the small dog aside only to be hit with the staff.

 

“I will not! I have sworn to do my duty!”

 

Bifur reaches down and picks up the small dog, lifting it up by the staff and swinging it around.

 

“Let go of my staff!” The dog bites Bifur’s paw causing him to be dropped. Bifur chases the dog around for few minutes while Kili stands with his arms crossed watching the whole situation. 

 

“Should we take bets?” He asks as he turns to Bofur.

 

“We could just run across the bridge while the small thing is distracted.” Bofur points to the wooden blank behind them and Kili is briefly tempted.

 

“Enough! Before this day never have I met my match in battle. This noble knight has fought me to a standstill. I, Sir Ori yield to thee, come let us be brothers henceforth and fight for the right as one.” Sir Ori holds out a tiny paw compared to Bifur’s, they shake in agreement. 

 

Kili and Bofur turn to make their way across the bridge once more. 

 

“Wait, I cannot let you pass! I have taken an oath and must defend it to the death. I have sworn with my life blood that no one shall pass this way without my permission.” Sir Ori straightens himself and tilts his chin as he stands against the group.

 

“Well, may we have your permission?” Kili asks, eyebrows raised together waiting for a response.

 

“Well, I, yes.” Sir Ori steps aside to let them through. “This bridge has lasted for a thousand years. It shall see you through in your journey.” 

 

Kili takes a step on the wooden plank only to have it collapse underneath him. He grabs onto a branch from one of the trees, his feet dangling above the bog.

 

“Fear not, I will save thee!” Sir Ori shouts as he runs down a path and out of view. 

 

“Don’t fall in, you’ll stench like the bog for the rest of your life. You’ll be stuck here smelling like rot then the king will really not like you!” Bofur shouts across the way and Kili shoots him a glare as he grips onto the branch tighter.

 

Bifur makes a low hollering noise, repeating it over and over. 

 

“What is he doing?!”

 

“I don’t know!” Bofur yells back at Kili. 

 

Bifur keeps up the noise until rocks appear from within the bog. They form a solid line in the bog from one side of the other creating a path. 

 

“You can summon rocks?” Sir Ori asks as he returns from behind a tree. The small dog is now riding a larger dog that has a saddle attached to him. Kili doesn’t take the time to let the image sink in, he tries to accept it for what it is as he lets go of the branch.

 

“Rocks friends.” Bifur starts walking across the rocks to where Kili has dropped down on a stone. He stretches out his hands and arms before continuing on to the other side of the bog.

 

“Alright, where in this forsaken place are we headed next?” 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk but this chapter cracked me up. sorry it wasn't as serious as the last but I have to break up the next few cause I want this to sit at ten chapters and I plan for the next one to go back more into their childhood.


	8. Neverland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He loves him the way that a mermaid falls in loves sunshine, basking in a warm glow. Falling in love with something they know they can’t have.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH BOY

“We have to be careful and pass through it quickly.” Bofur points to the new section of the labyrinth that they have reached.

 

“It looks like a landfill. Is this all trash?” Kili pokes one of the mounds with his foot and watches at various objects fall from the top and down the side. He takes a step back. 

 

“They’re objects, memories manifested from the children taken. Toys, blankets, lamps, chairs. Anything you can imagine, it’s all piled here. It’s the last place before the goblin city, the last test.” 

 

“Should be easy then.” Kili takes a step forward, his foot stepping on a small rag doll. He feels that since the only thing that would hold him back is Fili, since he is here for Frodo he should be fine. He doesn't have a lot of memories of his newly acquired cousin and what he does have are not nearly as impactful of the ones with his brother. 

 

"Most people who make it this far, don't make it back out." Bofur says as he remembers this part of the labyrinth, the first time he saw it and why he avoids it now. How he knows that somewhere in here is a little wooden bear that was carved for Bifur, that he held onto as a child and took it with him everywhere. 

 

“Hurts.” Bifur says as they make their way through the heap of objects. 

 

“I know.” Bofur takes one of Bifur’s paws in his hand as he helps guide him through the mounds of knick-knacks. 

 

“You don’t have to go through this part with me, if it’s too much, I wouldn’t ask that.” Kili feels a pang of regret for gathering these creatures in the labyrinth to help him on his quest.

 

“Nonsense good sir! We are brothers in arms and are on our way to the castle to retrieve the child.” Sir Ori waves his staff around as if he is decreeing a law. Kili smiles down at the brave dog. 

 

“What happened Bofur?” 

 

“We don’t have time for a story.” Bofur says as he tries to push past Kili.

 

“We do, come on, maybe it will help. I don’t want to lose either of you to this place.” 

 

“It was thousands of years ago in this realm, probably only a few hundred back home. See, Bifur, he was a good kid but he had this problem with his speech, didn’t talk so well. It was left to me to watch him most of the time after his parents had passed and my family had taken him in. I don’t know if their deaths had something to do with his talking, might have. I got frustrated a lot with him cause he couldn’t communicate the way other kids could.” Bofur takes a pause looking up at Bifur. “There these things in my culture, called ‘em faeirie rings. You were told to stay clear of them cause you don't want to be messing with the faeries. There was an old story we used to be told that if you went to one of them and asked for the king to come take away a child that he would. I took Bifur out there one day after I had been watching him. It was raining real bad, we were both soaked. He looked so miserable but he couldn’t even tell me what he was feeling, and I was so tired, I thought that I couldn’t do it anymore.” Bofur takes a moment to wipe away at a tear sliding down his cheek. 

 

“I’m sorry, you didn’t even know what was happening and I’m so sorry. You must have been so scared when he took you. I tried so hard, you have to know that. I tried so hard. I never understood what you must have been going through, your whole life no one understood you and I never even bothered to try.” 

 

Bifur makes it to his cousin in one stride, his large paw patting Bofur on the back in comfort.  _ “Friend.” _

 

Bofur chokes at the word, his second time hearing it today. 

 

“How do you not hate me? Look at what I’ve done to us.”

 

“No hate.”

 

“I should have been better for you. If I could, I would go back to the very beginning, I would have tried harder. I would have read you bedtime stories, I would have  _ listened _ to you because lord knows no one else was. You were just a child and I never stopped to think about what you were feeling.” 

 

“ _ Family. _ ” Bifur keeps patting Bofur on the back who is wiping at tears on his cheek. Kili stands with his arms crossed, his feet shifting. 

 

“Yeah, we’re family.” Bofur says as he leans into his cousin. 

 

“And this is why we will all try to get the small fellow in the castle, one less story for this place.” Sir Ori cuts in, the dog underneath his feet sniffing around at the objects. “Careful there Lancelot.” 

 

“Lancelot?” Kili asks looking at the dog.

 

“Yes, the bravest of Sir Arthur's knights!” 

 

“Didn’t he cause the civil war in the kingdom and ultimately Arthur's downfall?” Kili asks with a smirk as he bends down to pet Lancelot.

 

Sir Ori huffs as he kicks the sides of Lancelot, commanding the dog to turn. The dog ignores him and goes to Kili’s open hand instead. “He was a champion and great jouster. That is all I wish to remember him by.” 

 

Kili laughs, “your choice then.” 

 

“You know, I remember the first day when you’re brother came here.” Bofur says for a change of subject. “Perhaps we need to talk about you to ensure that you don’t get trapped in this field of memories.” 

 

“There isn’t a lot I remember. I remember that he was always there for me, no matter what. He never left my side.” Kili leans back against a large pile, odd things like stuffed animals and a table end poking at him. 

 

“He never once looked scared.” 

 

Kili smiles at this, “no he wouldn’t have. That’s how I remember him.” 

 

“Remembering? Oh deary, oh me, oh dear, who is talking about memories here?” An older looking goblin appears from one of the heaps, a large pack on her back filled with various memorabilia. 

 

“No!” Bofur shouts as the goblin grabs Kili by his hand and ushers him inside one of the mounds. 

 

Kili turns to try to leave but notices that he is now in his childhood bedroom, the one he shared with Fili. Everything is exactly as he remembers is. 

 

“Don’t you want to read a story?” The goblin goes to the bedside table and picks up a copy of _Where the Wild Things Are_ and hands it to Kili. He runs his fingers across the book, looking at Max in his kingdom. He remembers running around the house in his costume, remembers the broken mug and how he cried over it for hours. He remembers how it was Fili who made him feel better. 

 

“You could be the king of anything.” It's the second time he repeats this phrase to Kili. It's partially a ploy on his part, partially there is too much truth to it. He figures if he says it enough that the idea will grow in Kili's mind. 

 

Kili looks up from the book to see Fili standing in the room, his fingers running across the dresser. 

 

“Leave us.” Fili looks down at the goblin who pushes open the bedroom door and goes back out into the landfill. 

 

“I had forgotten what this place looked like. I guess I needed you to remember.” Fili doesn’t make eye contact with Kili, too nervous in his own way to face his brother. He picks up a small toy dinosaur from the bookshelf then sets it back down. 

 

“Fee,” Kili stands, setting the book back down. 

 

Sitting on the bookshelf is a golden paper crown. Fili picks it up with a smile and finally looks at Kili. “Do you remember this?” Fili wants to tell him that he could be the king of this place, that maybe he would be able to convince him to stay. That maybe he would love him enough to do it on his own. 

 

“I do, I remember how you put it on my head and let me run around the house like I was wild. I remember jumping on the beds and trying to climb the tree in the backyard before you pulled me down.” 

 

“You were too small, you would have never made it.”

 

“I could have, I could have climbed it.” Kili says it with such surety. 

 

Fili runs his fingers along the pointed edges of the paper. It feels exactly how he remembers it, though he supposes that is the point of this place. He walks over to his brother, closing the small space between them. He waits a moment for Kili’s reaction, Kili who doesn’t move but instead squares his shoulders as he looks at him. Fili places the crown upon his head, a small smiled playing on his lips. 

 

“It’s funny, it actually fits you now.”

 

“Obviously my head would grow.” 

 

“Do you always have something to say?” Fili asks trying to stifle a laugh.

 

“Yup.” Kili grins at him and then lets his smirk fall. “You aren’t mad at me for what happened in the dream?” 

 

“I am not mad at you, you’re trying to do the right thing. I was hurt, of course I was. I’ve been waiting for you for a very long time but I cannot bring myself to be mad at you. If I do then I am no better than all the kings before me, then I am no better than this place. I will hold onto forgiveness and hope in turn that you can forgive me.” 

 

“Forgive you? What do I need to be forgiving you for?” Kili reaches up to touch the paper crown, his fingers tracing it's pattern. He tries to think of a cautionary tale, something to pull him back to reality but looking into Fili's eyes and listening to his words he thinks that wax wings were made to melt and his brother was always just a sea for him to drown in. 

 

“For not being what you thought I should be. Instead I am this treacherous creature who deserves no kindness.” Fili's eyes flash silver, he hopes that he can be golden in Kili's arms. 

 

Kili pauses, of course he never expected to see Fili, and he sure as hell wasn’t expecting any of this. He understands though what a place like this could do to someone. “Do you remember what our mother used to say about you?” 

 

“That I had pirate’s blood and a prince’s heart.” Fili tries not to smile as he looks at Kili. Kili and his untamed hair, his long limbs and tanned skin. His thick arched eyebrows and his strong jaw. He loves him the way that a mermaid falls in loves sunshine, basking in a warm glow. Falling in love with something they know they can’t have. 

 

“Well, I always believed that. You do still have that heart somewhere in there Fee, I know it. You know how you told me that you talk to the stars and hope that they tell me about you? I once saw a shooting star and thought that it was you out there in Neverland. I always dreamed that one day I would get stupid fairy dust and find my way to you. Yeah this isn’t ideal Fili, it really isn’t, but honestly I would take this over nothing.” 

 

“What do you mean?” Fili asks looking up at his brother, their slight height difference endearing to him. 

 

Kili shifts on his feet, hesitant for a moment. He wonders if there would be sunlight between their lips. He makes the move and leans down. His heart hammers in his chest, a wild drum beat. Their lips touch. Their kiss tells a story, one meant for dusty bookshelves, a story of sunshine in the middle of a crumbling world. Maybe there is another world that exists where loving each other would be easier, but they have this one made with battlefields and lightning strike spines. Somewhere that would be softer for them both, gentler.

 

Kili leans down into him harder, his fingers gripping Fili’s hips as he deepens their kiss. He wonders if there should be some sort of alarm going off in his head about this but he can’t find himself to have this any other way. Fili is warm, his lips softer than he imagined them to be, full between his own. Kili takes a hand, reaching up to rest his thumb in one of Fili’s dimples. He pulls back smiling, resting their heads together as their exhales mingle. 

 

“I have to get him back.” 

 

“I know,” Fili whispers against his lips. “Go, I’ll meet you in the castle. You understand that I have to follow the rules of the labyrinth until the time is up.” Fili takes a step back from him, their fingers lingering in each other's touch. 

 

“I do.” Kili steps forward once more, chasing Fili’s lips, chasing the warm glow. Chasing, chasing, chasing. This place is a city for a wild boy who didn’t know he should have been running. 

 

“Then I’ll see you soon.” Fili kisses him one last time, trying to ignore the spreading in his chest. He doesn’t want to hold onto this, but he finds himself wanting to cling to it the way ivy clings to castles; how it grows towards the sun.

 

“You think that I’ll make it in time?” Kili asks as his lingers in the doorway.

 

“I know you will.” Fili says with a small smile as he watches Kili run out to meet his friends. 

 

The best way to love a broken boy is to let him build a kingdom out of you. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fhaswfhjas;fagh;fhja`-rs;hja ;ioydfja;sfd honestly me screeching


	9. Two Kingdoms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is how the mirror shatters, how the apple falls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spends ten minutes thinking of a chapter title and gives up

Fili doesn’t remember the feel of seasons, how winter bites and fall smells like embers and smoke. He thinks though that springtime feels the way when Kili’s eyes catch his. 

 

All he has had it darkness, strange stars, and his hourglass musing.

 

They’re both hopelessly in love with their memories, echoes of another time, another place. Memories of princes, of pirates, and wild things. 

 

* * *

When Kili emerges from his childhood room, out into the heap of mementos. The sun is setting, the horizon pulling down the dusky shades and bringing forth a sky filled with purple and stars.

 

“We’re right at the castle gates.” Bofur points ahead of them, to a wall that has appeared with two large round doors. 

 

Kili leaps over objects, over chairs and toys. It reminds him of his childhood and his face breaks out in a grin until he reaches the gates. There are two guards at the door, leaning against the wall with their helmets pulled down. 

 

“You’re kidding me, they’re asleep.” Kili taps one of them on their helmet. 

 

“Never said the goblins were very good at their job, it’s mainly the magic in this place that keeps people from reaching this part.” 

 

“Excuse you sirs!” Sir Ori takes his staff and hit one of them alongside the head.

 

“You’re going to knock them unconscious and they’ll never wake up!” Bofur shouts at the dog who is moving quickly between the two guards and hitting them. 

 

The door makes a creaking noise, as if it hasn’t been moved in ages. They all back up a few steps to take a look at the door. A tall mechanical figure begins emerging from the door, a clockwork guard over ten feet tall with a swinging axe. 

 

“Oh fu-” Kili ducks out of the way before the axe comes crashing onto the ground, his elbows hit the sand, skin scraping. 

 

Sir Ori is at the base of the mechanical beast, sitting on his dog and hitting it in the shins repeatedly. Bofur rushes behind them, to the back of the creature and begins climbing it. 

 

“What are you doing?!” Kili shouts up at him.

 

“Saving you lot!” Bofur reaches the top, his hands gripping the head of the iron giant. The head comes flying off only to reveal a small goblin inside working the machine. Bofur picks him up with ease and tosses him down to the ground. The goblin gets up and goes running. 

 

Bofur sits in the seat, hitting the buttons and pulling levers. The axe goes spinning causing everyone on the ground to run in various directions. The axe goes up and imbeds itself into the wall surrounding the city. Smoke rises from the machine. 

 

“Bofur, get out of there!” Kili yells up at his friend who takes the ten foot dive out of the machine and into his cousin's arms. 

 

Bifur sets him down gently and they all run towards the gate. The doors open with ease to reveal a desolate and empty city. The houses tilt to the side, some of the tops smaller than the bottoms. Some houses are three, four, five stories high, some are thin and some are wide. 

 

“I feel like I just stepped into a Tim Burton film.” 

 

“What?” Bofur asks him curiously. 

 

“You guys need TV here or something. Where is everyone?”

 

“I’m sure the king has evacuated the city of civilians and all of the guards will be here in a moment to try to stop us.” 

 

* * *

“Your highness, your highness! The boy, the dwarf, and Sir Ori are here, they have reached the city!”

 

Fili is unphased by this, his eyes on the hourglass. 

 

“Do what you must.” His voice comes across tired, he shows them no panic like the king had before them when someone had reached the city walls. 

 

The guard nods his head before rushing out with a small army behind him. 

 

He only worries what he will do now that Kili will be gone and out of his grasp once more. 

 

* * *

Before they reach the steps of the castle they are surrounded by a swarm of guards. Sir Ori sticks to his vow, attempting to fight off as many of the guards as he can at once.

 

Bifur roars, similar to his call from the bog. The ground around them shakes as boulders are summoned from somewhere beyond the city gates, rolling down the uneven streets to help fight off the goblins. 

 

Bofur runs past the group of goblins, Kili shouting at him, “what are you doing?!”

 

“Creating a distraction!” 

 

“All you’re doing is running in a circle!” Kili sounds exasperated as he watched the chaos unfolding before him. The goblins are fighting each other, fighting them, and fighting themselves. They’re not the brightest, and not the best trained. 

 

“But it’s working!” Bofur grins as he runs another lap with a group of guards chasing him, he runs them up a side alley just as a boulder is rolling down it. Bofur ducks into one of the small houses to the side as the boulder knocks out the group of goblins. 

 

The rest of the guards seem to have fled the area. Sir Ori cheers and shouts non-threatening words at the fleeing figures. “You are no match for these good knights!” 

 

Kili resists the urge to scratch Sir Ori behind his ears, telling him that he was a good boy. 

 

“See, told you it worked.” Bofur is dusting off his knees and shirt as he walks back up to the group.

 

“Yeah, I suppose you were right.” Kili smiles down at him as they keep moving on.

 

They reach the castle, Kili’s footsteps fast against the stone floors. He turns to his new found friends once they reach the doors, “I have to do this alone. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, but I need to speak to him.” 

 

Bifur and Sir Ori nod in understanding. It is Bofur who speaks for them, “should you need us, we will be right here.” 

 

Kili smiles at them before pulling the iron doors open. He runs through them and navigates his way through hallways and stairs till he gets to an empty throne room.

 

He doesn’t take his time to look at the details, the polished stones and how they vary from the ones in the labyrinth, or the strange high back throne made from different types of bones. Instead he runs through the room and to a set of stairs. 

 

The floor shifts beneath him, the staircase moving as it moves him to a doorway. Kili’s steps are quick as he runs through the door and into a room filled with nothing but stairs. The stairs move in different directions, some of them upside down, twisting and turning and designed to confuse those in the room. 

 

In the center sits his cousin, a tiny fist in his mouth with drool running down his chin. “Frodo!” Kili shouts as he runs to the ledge of the staircase that he is on, looking over the side to see how he can possibly get down. 

 

Each step that he takes seems to take him further from the center of the room. He ends up on the ceiling, physics apparently not a factor in this realm. He runs through an archway and ends up on a platform that overlooks the center where his cousin still sits. 

 

It doesn’t seem like too far of a fall.

 

Kili goes to the side, he hangs off of the ledge, his knuckles tight as he grips onto the stone. He takes a breath before he lets go. 

 

The scene shifts around him, the stairs and walls disappearing, taking him to the sand dunes back by the beginning of the labyrinth, the only difference now is that it is night and the sky is streaked in strange hues of purple and yellow, freckles with bright stars. 

 

Fili is leaning against a barren tree, the clock a few minutes left before midnight. 

 

“Where is he?” 

 

“In his crib at home.” Fili pushes himself off of the tree with his foot, his voice feigning control. 

 

“What?”

 

“You defeated the labyrinth and I held up my end of the deal. He is back in his room, and you are free to go.” Fili summons forth one of his crystal balls, spinning it in his hand a few times before tossing it out between them. A door opens to Bilbo and Thorin’s house, through it Kili can see Frodo’s crib. 

 

Fili looks upon his brother, and everything has come back sevenfold. When he first saw him he thought him to be a mirage, an ongoing thirst. He doesn’t know who between them is the one casting magic.

 

Kili walks towards him slowly, his hands unsteady at his sides. This is the last chance that he has to try to make something of this, to try to make any sense of it.

 

“You know I stopped talking about you. I guess if I didn’t talk about you then it didn’t hurt, then I didn’t know what I was missing.” It’s all very fairytale and forget-me-nots. 

 

“Please, don’t.” Fili takes a step back, his face looking away. His voice is soft, barely a whisper. 

 

“No, you need to hear this.” 

 

“I need to hear none of it!” Fili looks back at him, his eyes wide. He knows what he wants is different from what is right, and all he wants is to do the right thing. “I would blanket the world in darkness, in nothing but night and show you all of the stars. I would move the stars for you.” The sky above them shifts, comets and shooting stars go whirling past at Kili’s words.

 

It’s a measure, it’s multitudes and absolutes. 

 

“But this is not your world.” This is how the mirror shatters, how the apple falls. The sky stops spinning, the stars standing still. He has never used the magic in the realm to that magnitude, he never thought it possible but when Kili is around there is always the feeling of electricity crackling on his fingertips. 

 

“Can’t it be?” Kili takes a step closer and Fili can’t find it in himself to try to move away. Kili is crowding his space, his hands searching, making oceans out of his spine and mountains out of his fingertips. 

 

“I can’t ask that of you.” Fili breathes against his lips. 

 

“You aren’t asking. I’m telling you what I want.” 

 

“What is that exactly.” Fili takes one of Kili’s hands bringing it up to his lips and brushing the knuckles with feather light kisses. He knows he shouldn’t be doing this, that it could possibly be influencing what Kili is saying but he doesn’t know how to stop himself. Not when this is all that he has wanted.

 

He figures he has given him the opportunity to leave, that he made a statement that this is not where he belongs but he knows that he is not the man to put up a firm argument about it. He knows that he is selfish at times and that if his brother wants this then who is he to deny him. 

 

“You. I want you. Can’t you leave here? Can’t you come home?” Kili’s eyes are searching as Fili drops his hand and takes a small step back.

 

“There must always be a king.” He doesn’t say anything about home, he leaves the statement for what it is. 

 

“So you would have to find another?”

 

“Yes, and this is not something that I can put on anyone. I would never be able to pass this curse along to anyone else. It is my duty and it will remain that way.”

 

“What happens to me then? Am I supposed to forget this happened? Am I supposed to grow and and die knowing that you were somewhere reachable the whole time?” His temper flares, builds up inside of him. Always quick to anger.

 

“You know what the other option is, I just will never ask it of you.” Fili’s voice remains calm, even after all these years apart he feels like he still knows him better than the lines on his own hand. 

 

“Then I stay.” Kili shrugs his shoulders as if it is the most obvious thing in the world. 

 

“Kee,”

 

“Don’t pretend like you don’t want it.” 

 

“I do. I am not the kind brother I should be. I should push you away and make you go home to live your life and grow to be the person that you want but I can’t tell myself that I don’t love you and that I haven’t dreamed about this day for hundreds of years because I have. I have dreamed of so much with you.” 

 

“Have you always known?” 

 

“After you were born I always knew there would never be anything but you. We may have had time and this realm separating us but while you were trying to forget about me I was always looking for you. Always searching for that little boy with wolf grin.” 

 

Kili doesn’t hesitate, he surges forward, his hands cupping Fili’s face as he kisses him. 

 

He doesn’t want textbooks, responsibilities, and a half beating heart. He doesn’t want a world where children are taught about ivory towers and knights, children learning to fly. He wants this dusky land, it’s faded hues. He wants the strange stars in the sky and his brothers hands on his hips, the weight of his ribs between his thighs. 

 

“At least go back until your family gets home. See them one last time and when they are all asleep I will come back for you.” They are pressed tightly together so much that Kili is sure that not even a tide would be able to come between them. 

 

“Will you though?” 

 

“I will. It is only right that they see you one last time. Don’t let it be like when I was taken.” 

 

Kili’s heart aches at the thought, a guilt of what it will do to Thorin, to Dis, to Bilbo. 

 

“Ok, yeah. I’ll go back and wait for you.” He tries to ignore the twisting knot in his chest.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ngl I hate this chapter, sorry if it seems off. I just really didn't want to write the scene of the battle in the city like at all, this has been in my documents for a few days and I've been avoiding it


	10. Cautionary Tale or a Home for Fairy Tales

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili tells him about the years before they met, he tells him about how he was made of brick and bone and castle walls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> massive thanks to nasri who kicked my ass into writing the last chapter of this, tho she probably didn't realize she did.

Only minutes have passed in Kili’s world when he returns. He stands in Frodo’s room looking down at his cousin who is looking up at him with wide eyes. Kili reaches down and picks him up, cradling him close to his chest. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Kili repeats the words over and over. “You’re not a bad kid, you didn’t deserve any of that.” He kisses his cousin's forehead, breathing in the smell of his lavender shampoo that is supposed to help him sleep. 

 

“Do you want to come downstairs with me? We’ll watch a movie or something until Thorin and Bilbo get back.” He’s more so talking to himself than anything but his own words sound reassuring. 

 

Downstairs sitting on the coffee table is his phone. He puts Frodo on his lap then reaches over to scroll through his contacts. He heart tightens, a hand gripping around it as he clicks on his mother’s name. 

 

He debates between a call and a text and decides on a call. It’s not unusual for Kili to call her with a complaint and he figures if this is the last that he’ll speak to her it would be better for her to actually hear him. Or perhaps he is the one that needs to hear her. 

 

“Is everything ok?” Her voice is soft and even with the hint of a rush to her words. 

 

“Yeah, why wouldn’t it be?” Kili asks with his heart racing. 

 

“The last time you had called when you were babysitting Frodo had gotten a fever and you didn’t know what to do.” She’s gentle and kind despite what the world has given her and Kili can only hope that she will remain the same even after he’s gone. 

 

“Everything is fine. I just wanted to talk to you is all.”

 

Dis laughs. “You never want to just talk my boy.” 

 

Kili waits a beat before he speaks again. “I saw a book in Bilbo’s library, one that I think I read when I was a kid.” 

 

“What was it?” 

 

“The Labyrinth.” 

 

There is movement and a heavy sigh on the other end of the line. 

 

“Do you remember that book?” Kili asks when she doesn’t respond. 

 

“I do. You were obsessed with it as a child. I gave it to Bilbo for his collection to try to clear it from your mind.”

 

“What?” Kili asks sitting up, pulling Frodo closer to him.

 

“When you started to learn how to read you found it and it put wild ideas in your head. You used to tell me that, that your brother was off with the goblins. The idea was too much to handle and I had already been telling you that he was in Neverland. Peter Pan is a much nicer story than a story about some evil place with goblins.” 

 

“It’s not evil.”

 

“What was that dear?” 

 

“It’s not evil.”

 

“This is the same argument I had with you when you were nine. It just wasn’t worth the argument anymore Kili. I spent many years trying to tell you that your brother was in a better place and as much as I want to believe that myself the fact is that he’s gone.” He can hear the battle leaving her voice, her strength dissipating with each syllable. 

 

The ocean calls to pirates, it calls to them to tell them about the dangers of land and the things that lay on it. There is treasure hidden in the ground but there is love that walks the sands and that is why the ocean is a siren call, an escape from the treacherous waves of heartbreak. He thinks of Captain Hook, of all of these skewed versions of what he has been told and thinks that there are two sides to every story. 

 

“I’m sorry.” Kili says it before he can think about what he’s doing. 

 

“For what?” 

 

“I’m sorry that Fili was taken. I’m sorry that I spent my whole life trying to be myself and trying to be him when I didn’t always remember what he was like. I’m sorry I tried to fill that void because there were days when I didn’t think I knew who I was because of it. I know that I loved him though and I know that he was kind and that no matter where he is right now that he still loves you the same way that I love you. None of this was your fault and I hope that you know that. I used to hear you when I was younger, talking to dad and I know how much you wished you could take back that night and decide to stay home instead. No matter what happens I just want you to know that I love you.” 

 

Silence. Static. He hears his mother sniffle. “This sounds oddly like a goodbye.” Her voice chokes out. 

 

“It’s not.” It is. “I love you. I don’t tell you enough, that’s all.” 

 

“I love you too.” 

 

He hits the end call button, trying to ignore the tightening in his throat. 

 

* * *

It’s three more hours before Bilbo and Thorin make it home. Kili is leaning back on the couch with Frodo asleep on his chest. He keeps a hand on his cousin’s back, his fingers moving in small circular motions.

 

Bilbo smiles when he walks through the door, going to Frodo and taking him from Kili’s arms. “Looks like you two had a good night.” Bilbo kisses Frodo’s forehead as Kili sits up on the couch. 

 

“He was a little cranky in the beginning but we got is sorted.” Kili smiles fondly at them.

 

“You and Bilbo spoil him, he won't want to sleep in his crib.” 

 

“Us? I’m surprised he doesn’t just sleep in our bed with how much you hold him.” Bilbo whisper yells at Thorin who blushes and takes Frodo from his arms. 

 

Kili laughs, he grips his knees and laughs harder then he should causing Frodo to stir in Thorin’s arms. “Sorry,” Kili whispers as he stands up. He tries not to dwell on this moment, tries not to attach lingering guilt to it. Instead he takes in his family, memorizes the shape of Thorin’s jaw, his hands that cradle Frodo and remembers how they held him as a child. He takes in Bilbo’s smaller frame, his squared shoulders and straight posture. He’ll always be grateful for having Bilbo in his life, Bilbo who always was the first to sit down and listen to Kili. 

 

“Why don’t you stay the night here? It’s late and you can head out in the morning after breakfast.” Bilbo walks over to Kili and runs a hand down his back. It’s a small gesture but comforting and reminds him that this will always be his home in ways. 

 

He smiles weakly at Bilbo, “yeah I would like that.” 

 

* * *

 

It’s not like how growing up like a prince should have been. There weren’t manners and rules to abide by, there were no other kingdoms. The only thing Fili ever felt like he had in common with a prince was the urge to break free and soar above the forests.

 

Time moves slower in his realm, he has nights, he has the sky changing, waxing and waning as he waits for his brother. He thinks about how Kili looked at the sky here, how his eyes squinted at the dusky haze. 

 

At night he thinks about the sea, about salt water waves. He thinks about horizons and open clear skies. He uses his crystals to watch Kili moving through a different space and time. There is a war waging inside of him, one that screams a battlefield of hurt. It tells him to let Kili go, to let him live his life. To offer some sort of apology or confession. Then there is the opposing side, the one that tells him that they have entwined fates and there is no use in fighting it. 

 

It’s how ocean waves break, how they go back and forth, back and forth to the shore.

 

He goes with the tide, with the waves in his veins that make his heart swell. 

 

* * *

Kili paces around the guest bedroom. He has a light on low, the bed remains untouched. He peers out the window every few minutes, his feet and heart racing. As he paces he feels as if he is standing in the ocean and that the waves are being pulled away from him, that vertigo feeling of not moving but the earth is spinning underneath.

 

His mind thinks of a million different things. He thinks of blood stained armor, of villains in children’s stories. He thinks that if this book has come to life then surely there must be other fairy tales expanding like tendrils into his world. 

 

It’s  _ impossible _ , all of it should be impossible. But the stars are shifting, creating different skies and different worlds and in one of them where time moves slowly his brother waits for him. He bites the inside of his cheek as he thinks about the years ahead of them. He’s lost so many but they have centuries ahead of them to make up for it. 

 

Kili turns away from the window and goes to pace back towards the bedroom door. He stops in his tracks when he notices Fili sitting on his bed. His shoulders are slumped, his body more relaxed. It doesn’t seem like the right word, defeated seems more fitting for his posture. Kili’s breath catches. 

 

“It’s not too late.” Fili’s voice is quiet, his eyes avoiding Kili’s.

 

“You obviously want me to come otherwise you wouldn’t have made the effort into coming just to say that to me. You would have just never shown and left me to wonder my whole life.” Kili takes a step forward causing Fili to look up at him. 

 

“I’m not any good for you.” Fili shakes his head as his hands grip the edge of the bed. 

 

“That’s not for you to decide.” Kili takes another step forward. 

 

“I’m selfish and cruel-”

 

“And a liar.” Kili is standing in front of Fili, his hands reaching out to rest on his shoulders. He looks out of place in this world, his old fashioned extravagant clothes strange against the backdrop of IKEA furniture. 

 

Fili grabs Kili by the back of his thighs and pulls him closer. He’s already too far into this, too far gone to worry about being hesitant. “I do not know what this realm will do to you.”

 

Kili shifts so he can push Fili back onto the bed, he puts his legs on either side so he is straddling his brother’s solid frame. He rests his hands on Fili’s chest counting the beats he feels under his fingertips. “I’ll have you.” 

 

“You’ve always had me.” 

 

Kili leans down and kisses Fili, kisses him until he feels the room shifting around them the scene disappearing and swirling technicolor until they are in Fili’s bedroom chambers in his castle. Kili sits up, looking around in mild amazement before he leans down again and this time with more vigor. Fili grips Kili’s sides, his hands running up and down them and squeezing, his hands making sure the body against his is real. 

 

* * *

Fili tells him about the years before they met, he tells him about how he was made of brick and bone and castle walls.

 

“What are you made of now then?” Kili lays on his stomach as he watches Fili looking at the ceiling, the way that Fili’s eyes always seem to see something more than what is there. There are universes lying behind the walls, out in the reaches of this realm and Fili’s eyes always seem to see them. 

 

Fili pauses, his ears listening to the movement of the stars shooting across the sky beyond their castle walls. 

 

“Something a bit brighter.” 

 

* * *

It comes in small crystal flakes. They fall slowly. Fili looks out the castle window to the grey covered sky. “I don’t know what’s going on, I don’t know what this is.” His voice is panicked as he watches the creatures of the city rush into their small homes.

 

Kili rushes to the open window to look down at the layer of white covering the streets. He laughs as his arms snake around Fili’s waist. “It’s snow Fee.” 

 

Fili turns in his arms with his eyebrows knit together. “Snow?” 

 

“You do know what snow is right? Has it been that long?” Kili asks leaning back with his arms still wrapped around Fili.

 

“I know what it is Kili, I just never thought that I would see it again.” 

 

Kili drags him outside and watches as the flakes catch in his brothers long eyelashes turning them white, how the cold turns his nose pink.

 

“I don’t understand what’s happening.” Fili says as Kili pulls him close to him, swaying their bodies back and forth to music in his mind. 

 

“We’re dancing,” Kili replies in a singsong voice. 

 

Fili narrows his eyes at him. 

 

“Oh, you mean with the snow. Does it matter?” Kili’s eyes shine in the bright white of the weather. 

 

“No, I suppose it doesn’t.” 

 

* * *

The sky turns gold and red, endless and vast.

 

Fili shows him the forest, a lively green thing filled with bright leaves. He picks up a flower from the base of a large tree, yellow and vibrant. 

 

“I thought things didn’t grow here.” Kili takes the flower from Fili’s hand feeling the soft petals between his fingertips. 

 

“They didn’t, not the whole time that I have been here.” 

 

“What’s changed?” Kili holds the flower up to his nose breathing it in, sweet and earthy. 

 

“You.” 

 

* * *

He makes him a crown of black, it’s spikes long and thin. It rests upon Kili’s head beautifully blending against his long dark hair. From a distance his eyes bleed black, flashing the same color as his crown, but Fili knows they are flecked with hues of green and brown. That they shine even in the darkest of nights.

 

He wears the crown not for himself but for the look on Fili’s face every time he sees Kili in his, how his eyes widen and his breath quickens. It’s in the moments that Kili lightly runs his hands along his brother’s wrists and down his arms, to his sides, down to his thighs and in between. 

 

“Call me your king and swear your fealty to me,” Kili whispers darkly against Fili’s lips. He wears nothing but the crown upon his head, his lips hovering against Fili’s collar bone. 

 

“I owe you everything, I owe you all of me. I am your humble servant, my king.” He places his lips to Kili’s shoulder, to his neck, and his jaw. 

 

“Swear it,” Kili moans against him.

 

“I swear it.” 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you everyone so much for going on this ride with me, it's been fun but it's time for me to move onto other projects, like my zombie fic. I appreciate everyone's continuing support in my crazy adventures, you're all amazing.

**Author's Note:**

> You can follow me on tumblr, and all of my antics, at [killaidanturner](http://killaidanturner.tumblr.com/)


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